THE LAST QUESTION: ARE WE THERE YET?

Paul Lehr. 'Nuff said.

Gonna repost this one cuz it leads with one of my personal all-time favoritest short stories (ergo the entire list must be just fine, oder?) and cuz it puts one of Paul Lehr's glorious hallucinatory extravaganzas front and center.

But just what might that short story be you ask? Oh, just Isaac Asimov's shiveringly delightful The Last Question, which manages to bring a parable-like, anecdotal poignancy to a (literally) out-of-time cosmic scale. I've gone said it before, gone say it again: Non coerceri maximo, contineri minimo, divinum est.

Anyway, the only other story out of the list that I've read is Escape from Spiderhead by the posterchild of every literate American yuppie's pretentious post-DFW mind George Saunders and, while it may not be entirely to my taste, I'll grant that it isn't too shabby in terms of writing.

Since I've been trying to streamline my interests lately -- and, yes, I've resorted to quickie iPhone quizes for some language maintenance -- figure it's as good a time as any to brush up on some shorts stories. And if they're mind-bending as all-get-out, so much the better.

ANGELICA BILTÀ: OUR MAN LANDINI

Daaaaw

If Hildegard von Bingen's the Woman, Francesco Landini's the Man. At least among awesome 13th century composers. Anonymous 4's The Second Circle: Love Songs of Francesco Landini is absospiffinlutely luvverly.

And the NPR website just informed me that the Anonymous 4 group will be retiring this year. And there was much weeping and gnash-gnash-gnashing

Title text is taken from Landini's ballata for 2 voices, S. 54 Angelica biltà venut' è in terra. And here's the text:

Angelica biltà venut' è in terra. 

Dunque ciascun c'ama veder belezza, 

virtù, atti vezosi e legiadria,

vengha veder costei che sol vagheza, 

arà die lei si com' l'anima mia. 

Ma non credo con pace tanta guerra. 

Angelica biltà.

To be perfectly honest I'm not totally sure what the "ma non credo con pace tanta guerra" refers to.

BLOG BACKLOG: UPDATES

Afraid my productivity has slipped a bit of late. Not sure if it's work-related or just getting old. Current status of projects:

Still working through Schulenberg's The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach a few pieces at a time. Today I listened to a little trio of minuets (BWV 841-843) Bach seems to have used pedagogically. About half-way through. The sheer exhaustiveness of it is impressive, and it complements listening quite well, particularly as Schulenberg doesn't address the listening experience as much as editorial, manuscript and musicological issues behind the song.

Also about halfway through the complete Kinder- und Hausmärchen of the Grimm Bros, which is about as peculiar as you might expect. Unfortunately that's about the only language work I've got at the moment, although I watched a French film pretty much every night in January.

 

MUSIC OF THE SPHERES: NOTE TO SELF

Hildegard von Bingen is joining Boethius as one of the patron saints of my Music of the Spheres superhypernovel.

Why? Because this. And because Symphonia armonie celestium revelationum is Music of the Spheres material, that's why.

HILDEGARD VON BINGEN

Just listened to Sequentia's sublime rendition of Hildegard von Bingen's O vis aeternitatis (~ Power of eternity), the first track on their Canticles of Ecstasy album. Also found (via this page) a link to a image of the original manuscript repro'd below.

Old lady von Bingen is one of the most interesting of many interesting personalities from the Middle Ages. She invented a language, alphabet, composed music, wrote mystical works -- what's not to like? Shamefully, this is the first time I've actually heard any of her music.

Image below's Blatt 466 of the Rupertsberger Riesenkodex, which contains a copy of O vis aeternitatis. The Riesenkodex anthologized all the works of Hildegard von Bingen 12th century style. 466-81 contain her musical compositions. I must needs read this.

Add caption

CARMINA BURANA

Bache, bene venies
gratus et optatus
per quem noster animus
fit letificatus.

Thus begins the Clemencic Consort's 3 CD recording of a selection from the Carmina Burana - a collection of Golliard poems/texts/songs from the 11-13th century. Basically, the equivalent of a satirical college student magazine/newspaper done medieval style.

ONE THING I WILL SAY

One thing I will say about working Saturday evenings, you hear some weird music on NPR. The Taco Cats are all the rage in Seattle.