Some music is made for playing whilst cruising down the highway or getting ready to go out on the town. And some music is made for playing whilst wearing slippers, sipping coffee and glancing at the Sunday papers. Spiegel im Spiegel is most definitely in the latter category.
Written by Arvo Pärt in 1978, in his native Estonia, Spiegel im Spiegel is a minimalist piece in the so-called tintinnabular style of composition (a term coined by Pärt himself, from the Latin tintinnabulum, “bell”), wherein a melodic voice operating over diatonic scales, and a tintinnabular voice, operating within a triad on the tonic, accompany each other. The effect is calming and meditative.
The piece was written for a single piano and violin, and here is a beautiful version featuring Nicola Benedetti on violin and Alexei Grynyuk on piano. The piano plays rising crotchet triads and the violin plays slow, sustained notes, alternately rising and falling, and of increasing length.
Incidentally, Spiegel im Spiegel in German literally means “mirror in the mirror”, representing, I suppose, the idea of an infinity of images reflected by parallel plane mirrors: the tonic triads are endlessly repeated with small variations, as if reflected back and forth. In any event, if, like me, you cherish an occasional calm and still environment in a hectic world, this is for you. I recommend just putting the piece on at a quiet time and, rather than concentrating on it, simply let it fill the room with its serene quality whilst you do something else. You will be spiritually refreshed without even realising it!
I first properly heard this classic example of chanson française at the funeral of a friend’s dad, who had evidently loved the song and elected to mark his crossing with it: La Mer by French singer, Charles Trenet. The song positively drips with gallic nonchalance and romance. Legend has it that Trenet wrote a first version of the song when he was just 16, but La Mer as we know it was born in 1943, during a train trip in the South of France. Trenet, along with singer Roland Gerbeau and pianist Léo Chauliac, was travelling from Montpellier to Perpignan, along the beautiful French coast. Inspired by the scenery, Trenet wrote La Mer before the journey was over, and he and Chauliac performed the song that very evening.
At first, Trenet didn’t like the final version of La Mer, for some reason, so in fact it was Roland Gerbeau who first recorded it, in 1945. But a year later, Trenet’s record company boss convinced Trenet to have a go at the song as well. The music was rearranged and the song began its journey proper to chanson classic, becoming a huge success and a jazz standard.
By the time of Trenet’s death in 2001, over 70 million copies of La Mer had been sold and 4000 different versions recorded. The song has been translated successfully into multiple languages (hence Beyond the Sea, Il Mare, De Zee, Das Meer etc), and covered by a multitude of artists, of whom I think Rod Stewart does a particularly good version. But it is Trenet’s charmingly polished original in the French that irresistibly captures the imagination.
Listen here:
La mer
Qu’on voit danser le long des golfes clairs
A des reflets d’argent
La mer
Des reflets changeants
Sous la pluie
La mer
Au ciel d’été confond
Ses blancs moutons
Avec les anges si purs
La mer bergère d’azur
Infinie
Voyez
Près des étangs
Ces grands roseaux mouillés
Voyez
Ces oiseaux blancs
Et ces maisons rouillées
La mer
Les a bercés
Le long des golfes clairs
Et d’une chanson d’amour
La mer
A bercé mon cœur pour la vie
The Hudsucker Proxy is a 1994 fantastical comedy film by Ethan and Joel Coen. Sidney J Mussberger (Paul Newman), the new head of the hugely successful corporate monolith, Hudsucker Industries, in Fifties-era New York, comes up with a brilliant plan to make a lot of money: appoint a moron to run the company. When the stock falls low enough, Sidney and his friends can buy it for pennies, then take over and restore it to its former fortunes. They choose Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins), who has just started in the mail room, but soon, tough reporter Amy Archer smells a rat and begins an undercover investigation of Hudsucker Industries.
The Coens’ sense of the aesthetic is supreme, their knowing references witty to the extreme, and their style all their own. This movie, despite being a box office flop, is packed with delicious highlights but today’s blog focuses on the brilliant performance by Jason Jennifer Leigh. Leigh plays Amy Archer, the hardnosed reporter willing to do anything to get a good story, even going undercover to gain the trust of the über-naïve Norville. In the newsroom, she’s bold, sassy, and will inform anyone listening about her Pulitzer Prize. In a man’s environment, she’s the most capable of the lot and, as we’ll see, she can simultaneously talk on the phone to the chief, type a story, solve crossword puzzles, and fence fellow reporter Smitty with smart, fifties-hip wordplay.
If the concept of the quick-tongued, ace female reporter feels familiar, it should; in the great tradition of newspaper movies, Leigh is channelling a cross between Jean Arthur in Mr Deeds Goes to Town and Katharine Hepburn in Woman of the Year. In this scene, she has inveigled herself into Norville’s office and contrives to win his trust, playing the vulnerable maiden in distress and pretending to be “a Muncie girl”. Then cut to tough Amy in the newsroom, multi-tasking spectacularly and mocking the patsy, Norville. You can be sure her heart will soften in the end, but for now Leigh nails the stereotype character with aplomb.
Of course the Beatles had to make an appearance in this blog. Undeniably the most influential bands of the rock era, they took the musical world by storm, having gradually built their reputation over three years from their formation in 1960. They hold a rock-solid place in the hearts of most people of my generation and of many people since. But which song to choose from a canon so replete with the sublime?
I have gone with a song so utterly exemplary of the Beatles sound and feel, from their early heyday, and positively dripping with their youthful exuberance and melodic virtuosity. Written by Lennon and McCartney in the basement of Jane Asher’s parents’ house in Wimpole Street, London; recorded at Abbey Road’s studio two; and released in the UK on 29th November 1963, it’s I Want To Hold Your Hand. It sold more than a million copies on advanced orders alone, on the back of the success of She Loves You, and became the group’s first US number one, kick-starting the British Invasion of America.
Of all the televised versions of the song (notably on the Ed Sullivan Show, with the famous introduction “Here they are…the Beatles!”), I found this version from the Morecambe and Wise Show in 1964. Played live, it’s absolutely brilliant. Lennon’s and McCartney’s voices are constantly switching between unison and harmony, and there is a wonderful interplay between Lennon’s riffs and George Harrison’s subtle guitar fills. And throughout, of course, they just look so damn good together; it’s a delight to watch.
Niccolò dell’Arca (c. 1435-1440 – 1494) was an Italian Early Renaissance sculptor, about which little is known except for his possession of a sublime skill in the art of sculpture.
His Compianto sul Cristo morto (the Mourning, or Lamentation, of Christ) is a life-size group of six separate terracotta figures lamenting in a semicircle around the dead Christ, in the Sanctuary of Santa Maria della Vita in Bologna. Lamentations were commonly depicted in Renaissance Europe, it being the thirteenth of the Stations of the Cross. Here, the pain of Jesus’s friends, as he is taken down from the cross, could not have been expressed with more intense pathos. Sorrow digs into their faces, forever frozen in anguish.
More than 600 years after they were made, these fragile, now colourless terracotta statues continue to move and surprise visitors to the church who often don’t know about the church’s prized but untrumpeted possession. It’s a universal and timeless grief the figures express. The only peaceful figure of course is that of Christ who looks serenely asleep on a decorative scalloped coverlet. Each of the other figures’ dramatic pathos is intensified by the realism of the facial details.
It’s uncomfortable viewing, of course, due to the nature of the scene, but you know these Renaissance artists; they had a remarkable capacity for depicting pain and suffering, all part and parcel of the concepts embodied in the Christian religion. The anguish is stark, but the cause of the anguish becomes the focus for the Renaissance viewer: the dead Christ and the implications of that death for mankind. Check out the image details to fully appreciate Dell’Arca’s artisanship.
Sergei Prokofiev’s Dance of the Knights, also known as The Montagues and Capulets, comes from his ballet, Romeo and Juliet. It’s an emotionally charged piece of music, with strong horns and woodwinds layering over a powerful melodic line played by the strings. Prokofiev’s dark and brooding passages send chills up the spine and create a wonderfully dark atmosphere, presumably to express the tension between the rival families of the Montagues and Capulets. No wonder it’s used in film and television so often; not least, of course, in the BBC’s The Apprentice.
Like the original play Romeo and Juliet, the story of Sergei Prokofiev and his famous ballet with the same title is filled with betrayal, struggle and untimely death. After the Revolution, Prokofiev had left Russia with the official blessing of the authorities, and resided in the United States, Germany, and Paris, respectively, making his living as a composer, pianist and conductor. He was lured back to the Soviet Union in 1936 with promises of lucrative commissions, but the bureaucrat who commissioned Romeo and Juliet was executed, as was the Central Committee flunky who approved the ballet’s original happy ending (Prokofiev had originally changed Shakespeare’s tragic ending but this evidently did not go down well with the Russian authorities!). The authorities then exiled Prokofiev’s first wife to the Gulag, and in 1938 confiscated Prokofiev’s passport, determining that he needed “ideological correcting” from too much Western influence.
Despite all this interference, however, what comes down to us today is an iconic piece of musical drama, with Dance of the Knights being the standout piece. We watch it here performed by La Scala Milano, as the Capulets strut their stuff on the dance floor. Great costumes too!
All the dance greats of the twentieth century, from Fred Astaire to Michael Jackson, have cited the Nicholas Brothers as huge inspirations for their craft. Fayard and Harold Nicholas were born (in 1914 and 1921 respectively) to musician parents who played with the regular band at Philadelphia’s famous Standard Theater. Consequently, the brothers, who would sit in the theatre whilst their parents were working on stage, got to witness most of the great Afro-American performers, jazz musicians and vaudeville acts of the times.
The older brother, Fayard, taught himself how to dance, sing, and perform by watching and imitating the professional entertainers on stage and first performed alongside his sister Dorothy as the Nicholas Kids. Later, Harold joined, and when Dorothy opted out, they became the Nicholas Brothers. They performed a highly acrobatic and innovative dance technique known as “flash dancing”, incorporating elements of tap, acrobatics and ballet.
As word spread of their dancing talents, they became famous in Philadelphia and their career really took off in 1932 when they became the featured act at Harlem’s Cotton Club, performing with the orchestras of Cab Calloway and Duke Ellington. Harold was 11 and Fayard was 18. Spotted by Sam Goldwyn, they were invited to Hollywood and their movie career began.
Their performance in the musical number Jumpin’ Jive (with Cab Calloway and his orchestra), featured in the movie Stormy Weather, is considered by many to be the most virtuosic dance display of all time. It’s certainly wonderful to watch.
Johannes Vermeer is rightly considered one of the greatest painters of the Dutch Golden Age, but it wasn’t always so. Although modestly recognised in his lifetime in Delft and The Hague, he quickly slipped into obscurity after his death, and it remained that way for nearly two centuries, until his rediscovery in the 19th century by French art critic, Théophile Thoré-Bürger, who was so impressed when he came across Vermeer’s View of Delft that he spent years seeking out other paintings by this virtually unknown artist. Today, Vermeer’s paintings are of course lauded as masterpieces and worth mega-millions; should you ever come across his painting The Concert, which was stolen in 1990 and remains missing, do grab it – it’s worth about $200M.
Although “launched” by a cityscape and particularly famous for a tronie (Girl with a Pearl Earring), Vermeer painted mostly domestic interiors. As his biographer put it: “Almost all his paintings are apparently set in two smallish rooms in his house in Delft; they show the same furniture and decorations in various arrangements and they often portray the same people, mostly women”.
A prime example is today’s choice, The Milkmaid, painted around 1658 and showing a domestic kitchen maid, suitably attired and pouring milk into an earthenware pot (and thus possibly making bread pudding, judging by the amount of bread on the table). Vermeer’s careful design (there were several revisions) resulted in a masterpiece of light and shadow, colour, contours, and shape. He restricts his palette mainly to the primary colours of red, blue, and yellow, and the pigments are rich and vibrant – Vermeer is known to have used only the very best, and most expensive, pigments. Above all, the skill of the artist has wrought a remarkably realistic scene, with quirky but authentic features such as the foot warmer, lower right, and the hanging basket, upper right.
Sir Noël Coward: playwright, composer, director, actor and singer, known for his wit, flamboyance, debonair charm and what Time magazine called “a sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise”. We’ve met Coward before in this blog, due to his involvement with Brief Encounter. His songs have amused and charmed me for years: witty and knowing wordplay, precisely enunciated and put together with an extraordinary degree of scansion and unity, and often with a killer title: Don’t Let’s Be Beastly To The Germans, Could You Please Oblige Us with a Bren Gun?, I Went To A Marvellous Party…
Typical of his gloriously sardonic songcraft, is this week’s glimpse of the sublime, Don’t Put Your Daughter On The Stage, Mrs Worthington. In the Thirties, at the height of his powers, Coward was apt to receive a constant stream of letters from women begging him to find parts for their respective daughters in whatever he happened to be staging next. As Coward himself put it:
“Some years ago when I was returning from the Far East on a very large ship, I was pursued around the decks every day by a very large lady. She showed me some photographs of her daughter – a repellent-looking girl – and seemed convinced that she was destined for a great stage career. Finally, in sheer self-preservation, I locked myself in my cabin and wrote this song – “Don’t Put Your Daughter On The Stage, Mrs Worthington”.
The slapdown is exquisite. Enjoy its deft lyrics and jaunty tune, below. However, you won’t hear the fourth verse because this was pulled from the song as it was considered by the Lord Chamberlain too offensive for the prim 1930s Britain!
Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage, The profession is overcrowded And the struggle’s pretty tough And admitting the fact She’s burning to act, That isn’t quite enough. She has nice hands, to give the wretched girl her due, But don’t you think her bust is too Developed for her age? I repeat Mrs Worthington, Sweet Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage.
Regarding yours, dear Mrs Worthington, Of Wednesday the 23rd, Although your baby May be, Keen on a stage career, How can I make it clear, That this is not a good idea. For her to hope, Dear Mrs Worthington, Is on the face of it absurd, Her personality Is not in reality Inviting enough, Exciting enough For this particular sphere.
Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage, She’s a bit of an ugly duckling You must honestly confess, And the width of her seat Would surely defeat Her chances of success, It’s a loud voice, and though it’s not exactly flat, She’ll need a little more than that To earn a living wage. On my knees, Mrs Worthington, Please Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage.
Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Though they said at the school of acting She was lovely as Peer Gynt, I’m afraid on the whole An ingénue role Would emphasize her squint, She’s a big girl, and though her teeth are fairly good She’s not the type I ever would Be eager to engage, No more buts, Mrs Worthington, NUTS, Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage.
[Song normally ends here, but here’s the refrain that fell foul of the Censor]
Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage, One look at her bandy legs should prove She hasn’t got a chance, In addition to which The son of a bitch Can neither sing nor dance, She’s a vile girl and uglier than mortal sin, One look at her has put me in A tearing bloody rage, That sufficed Mrs Worthington, Christ! Mrs Worthington, Don’t put your daughter on the stage, or your son!
The Raven is a narrative poem by Edgar Allan Poe, published in 1845, famous for its dramatic, Gothic quality. The scene is set from the beginning: the unnamed narrator is in a lonely apartment on a “bleak December” night, with little more than a dying fire to light the room, when he hears an eerie tapping from outside his chamber door. Into the darkness he whispers, “Lenore,” hoping his lost love has come back, but all that could be heard was “an echo [that] murmured back the word ‘Lenore!'”. The tapping persisting, he opens the window whereupon the mysterious raven enters the room and perches atop a sculptured bust above his door.
The man asks the raven for his name, and surprisingly it answers, croaking “Nevermore.” The man knows that the bird does not speak from reason, but has been taught by “some unhappy master,” and that the word “nevermore” is its only response. Thus, he asks a series of questions, all eliciting the stock response at the end of each stanza.
Poe was very interested in expressing melancholy in poetic form. As he wrote in Graham’s Magazine in 1846: “Of all melancholy topics, what, according to the universal understanding of mankind, is the most melancholy?” – the answer, of course, Death. And when is Death most poetical? “When it most closely allies itself to beauty: the death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world”. Hence, the poem is about the despair of a bereaved lover, and Poe’s use of the raven – that bird of ill-omen – does little to suggest that a happy outcome is forthcoming! Perhaps the raven stands for the narrator’s subconscious as he struggles with the concepts of death and finality.
There is a lilting rhythm in play; it’s melodic as well as dramatic (and since you ask, it’s in trochaic octameter, with eight stressed-unstressed two-syllable feet per lines). There is frequent use of internal rhyme, and much repetition of rhyming around the “or” sound (Lenore, door, lore, nevermore).
Who better to narrate this great poem than the prince of horror himself, Vincent Price? Here he is in wonderful Gothic form, narrating, indeed acting, this dark classic…superb.
Edgar Allan Poe
Commentaries on excellence in art, music, film, and literature
