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READIN
READIN started out as a place for me
to keep track of what I am reading, and to learn (slowly, slowly)
how to design a web site.
There has been some mission drift
here and there, but in general that's still what it is. Some of
the main things I write about here are
reading books,
listening to (and playing) music, and
watching the movies. Also I write about the
work I do with my hands and with my head; and of course about bringing up Sylvia.
The site is a bit of a work in progress. New features will come on-line now and then; and you will occasionally get error messages in place of the blog, for the forseeable future. Cut me some slack, I'm just doing it for fun! And if you see an error message you think I should know about, please drop me a line. READIN source code is PHP and CSS, and available on request, in case you want to see how it works.
See my reading list for what I'm interested in this year.
READIN has been visited approximately 236,737 times since October, 2007.
Tuesday, January first, 2008
Be quiet the doctor's wife said gently, let's all keep quiet, there are times when words serve no purpose, if only I, too, could weep, say everything with tears, not have to speak in order to be understood.
I'm not sure quite why, but this line (from Blindness, after the doctor's wife has approached her husband and the woman with dark glasses, who have just had sex together) touches me very deeply.
At the matinée today we watched The Water Horse and greatly enjoyed it. But it had this problem: nothing about it was original. The characters were all stock characters, the plot was such that you knew very well at every moment what would be happening in the next minute. The shots all had a very familiar feeling to them.
What made it fun and enjoyable to watch (besides the skill and talent with which it was assembled, which were considerable), was sitting next to Sylvia and watching her take it all in. That same thing has saved worse movies for me. Like some of the corny, manipulative film tricks have worn off for me, but I can still experience the reaction to them at second hand.
We saw previews for a couple of films that looked just hilarious, one about an adventure writer who is an agoraphobe until she is called on by a young fan whose island paradise is invaded by pirates, and her main character comes to life and helps her save the day -- so many confused bits of cheese pasted together -- and one about an American Girl (tm) doll who comes to life and seeks employment in the misogynistic world of mid-20th-Century journalism, if I've got that straight.
posted evening of January first, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Sylvia
Gee, I hope I have more than a single melody in my head. The one I wrote out this evening is very similar in structure to "Sally's Sleeping" and "Sally Woke Up"; I am calling this one "Sally's Dreaming" (ABC format, PDF). Here are the three of them together:
posted evening of January first, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Songs
So I was working on a short air for viola this morning and I went to write it down; and I realized it was almost exactly the same song as Sally's Sleeping, except in 4/4 time instead of 12/8. That one difference makes it sound like quite a distinct song! (Well also I'm playing it in a different key and faster.) Here they are together:
Update: added a new melody to the Sally cycle. See new post for the recording.
Looking at the two side by side a little more, I realize there is another distinction: "Sally's Sleeping" starts on the tonic, and "Sally Woke Up" is a similar pattern of notes but starting on the third. This distinction must be something like an inversion but I'm not sure what words I would use in talking about it.
(Sylvia says, "So you mean, it's like Junie B. Jones and then Junie B., First Grader?" Exactly.)
posted afternoon of January first, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Fiddling
Hm, a couple of things seem not quite right with continuity in Blindness. Like for instance, my tracking of the time the inmates have been quarantined suggests it's been not so long, maybe a week at most, at the point the old man with the eye patch joins them. But the events he narrates from the outside world sound like they take place over a month or more. (More specifically, he is talking about many quarantine centers already being full of blind people; but before the arrival of the group he was in, this center was not full, and it was the very first one to be opened.) Also the wife of the first blind man says she went blind at home, weeping into a handkerchief; but she was already in the quarantine when she went blind, and this is not something I would expect her to lie about. Not a huge thing though. The narration is growing perceptibly more reserved since those remarks about formal language -- like the narrator is using formal language and technical detail to distance himself from the events he's describing.
I want to find out who is the owner of the "unfamiliar voice" being referenced in the scene where they all describe what was the last thing they saw before going blind. (And come to think of it, why is the opthalmologist's wife not reacting and identifying the newcomer?)
Thanks for reading, everybody! See you next year. (Expect the recent accelerated rate of posting to slow back a bit, there will be stuff to do at work.) Here ya go:
posted afternoon of December 31st, 2007: 2 responses ➳ More posts about Music
From this point onward, apart from a few inevitable comments, the story of the old man with the black eyepatch will no longer be followed to the letter, being replaced by a reorganised version of his discourse, re-evaluated in the light of a correct and more appropriate vocabulary. The reason for this previously unforeseen change is the rather formal controlled language, used by the narrator, which almost disqualifies him as a complementary reporter, however important he may be, because without him we would have no way of knowing what happened in the outside world, as a complementary reporter, as we were saying, of these extraordinary events, when as we know the description of any facts can only gain with the rigour and suitability of the terms used.
--José Saramago, Blindness
I'm struggling with this passage a little. It seems to me like it must be pretty important to the story, coming as it does near the center of the book and immediately after the scene in which the old man with the eyepatch, "the one person who was missing here", joins the inmates of the opthalmologist's ward. Some significant shift in the narration is occurring here -- this is the first time the narrator has referred to himself and to the job he is doing in this way. But it seems very strange for him to say "from this point onward", when throughout the story so far all dialog has been paraphrased to the point of dismissal -- nothing has been "followed to the letter".
posted evening of December 30th, 2007: Respond ➳ More posts about Readings
Wow, look! This is my nine-hundred and ninety-ninth post to this blog. The counter's about to roll over. Fun! Just in time for the new year.
So I came up with a little air for viola; I am inaugurating my new policy of giving my songs titles, by calling this one "Sally's Sleeping"; as Mr. Fritz observed in comments a few days ago, fiddlers name their tunes "after any damn thing". This is my first song (a) in 12/8 meter and (b) for which I was able to correctly work out notating the rhythm without help from ABCEdit's playback feature.
I found a streaming music player which is not dependent on Windows MediaPlayer, so I am going to try using it. Please let me know if either you were not able to play my music files before, and now you are, or you were able to play them before and now you are not. Thanks!
Here is the music for it, ABC format and PDF. Note that I didn't play exactly the same fourth bar that is written down; the whole point is to play a different variation every time.
posted morning of December 30th, 2007: Respond ➳ More posts about The site
So I'm watching Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid and thinking "Hm, all this shooting sure is getting confusing" and wander off. I bet there's a soundtrack record, now that'd be something to listen to.
Worked out one of the songs (possibly the theme?) on fiddle, it sounds pretty good as a short melody and some nice variations as well.
"Oceanside", Robyn Hitchcock, Live at the Cambridge Folk Festival. Not produced as well as the version on Perspex Island and I think they are playing at a faster tempo.
"Keep on the Sunny Side", Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Will the Circle be Unbroken. Can't say much about this. It is totally unironic and is Maybelle Carter's signature piece; I love it but it brings back unpleasant childhood sing-along memories.
"Penny Lane", Robyn Hitchcock. Lousy. I ought to take this concert off my iPod, there is no reason to keep it. The banter following the song -- "One of the things that really distinguished the '60s from the present was that they didn't have these things that say 'if you like that, try this!'" -- struck me as kind of humorous but not really up to RH banter standards.
"Rukus Juice Blues", Big Bill Broonzy. Awesome. Broonzy says "rookus", not "ruckus"; at first I thought he was talking about "ruby juice".
"Birds in Perspex", Robyn Hitchcock LCFF. Maybe my favorite RH song ever. But again, not up to the level of the album version -- this record could probably come off the iPod as well. It is impossible not to sing along with "come alive" even though I'm in public, sitting on a bench on the street.
"Pretty Little Dog", Critton Hollow String Band. Instrumental. Just right after #5. (from the "String Theory" compilation)
"This is the Last Time I'll Say Goodbye", The Sirens -- from the Apostropher's Don't Bogart That Groove compilation. I hadn't noticed before what a remarkable song this instrumental piece is. The music has a really structural feeling to it like it's building a walled passageway that you travel through -- the notes are textural elements in the structure. This has to maybe have something to do with percussion -- I've gotten the same feeling from some tracks on Perspex Island that have really strong drums.
"Johnny B. Goode", The Dead 2/27/77 -- this random set is trending toward songs that are totally characteristic of their performers.
"Mambo Dominica", David Murray Latin Big Band, from Don't Bogart That Groove. "Cute but corny" is my initial reaction. As I listen to it for a while (it is a very long song), I start to hear the horns more individually, less as part of a mass of sound, which is pleasant. This would be good music for walking.
"Each of her Silver Wands", Robyn Hitchcock 3/14/97 Knitting Factory. I don't know this song. It sounds like it could be pretty good but like he hasn't really written it yet at this performance. Very short.
The combination of numbers 1, 5, and 7 inspired me to listen to Perspex Island, which I had not in a while. It sure gets to me -- this is my favorite record of the year. When "Birds in Perspex" came on I had to run outside to avoid embarrassing myself by singing "come alive" in the Avery Fischer Hall lobby.
...Can I analyse the structure of "Birds in Perspex"? That is sort of what I wanted to do during my Song by Song project but I don't think it really came across. Every line of that song just really touches my heart -- the lyrics to be sure and the way they fall across the canvas of music. When Andy Metcalfe came in at the end singing "birds in perspex, come alive" it actually startled me that the person singing on the recording was not myself.
posted evening of December 28th, 2007: Respond ➳ More posts about random tunes
The Luddite Robot has a video of some very fine jazz violin playing by Joe Venuti. In comments, twindowlicker posts a link to some recordings of Stuff Smith.
