Johann Sebastian Bach: Everything In Music

Today is the birthday - in 1685 (Old Style calendar) - of Johann Sebastian Bach, often named as the greastest composer of all time. I was introduced to his music as an infant at Mount Calvary Lutheran Church in my little hometown in the mountains of Maryland. My interest in music grew and broadened quite a lot over the years but my awe and appreciation of Bach never waned.

J.S. Bach portrait at age 61 Elias Haussmann, Germany, 1746

Bach gave us some of the most sublime music in western culture and it would be an oversight, especially as a Lutheran, not to honor this master of the Baroque and pillar of Lutheranism. His music was largely forgotten for a few generations following his death (1750), but had been restored by the first quarter of the 19th century. The new-found popularity of Bach was due largely to the composer-performers, Felix Mendelssohn and Ludwig van Beethoven, and the publication of many of Bach's works.

In this post commemorating the 338th anniversary of his birth, Bach's music is the real content. No need for names, dates, places, and details. Let the music speak for him.

The late Canadian pianist, Glenn Gould, was perhaps the most technically perfect interpreter of Bach's keyboard music in our lifetime. His performances were filled with eccentricities - see his Wikipedia enry for more details - including his well-known vocal accompaniment that drove sound engineers mad and some classical music purists away from his concerts. At the same time no one could deny that Gould was a magician at the keyboard. Here he is playing several of Bach's Goldberg Variations, BWV 988. Bear with the soft sound for the first three minutes. The magic along with Gould's vocal noises fills the rest of the video.

From what is generally recognized as his most well-known cantata, Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140, here is the opening chorus. This work is also known as Sleepers Awake.

Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme

Wake up, the voice calls us

Der Wächter sehr hoch auf der Zinne,

of the watchmen high up on the battlements,

Wach auf, du Stadt Jerusalem!

wake up, you city of Jerusalem!

Mitternacht heißt diese Stunde;

This hour is called midnight;

Sie rufen uns mit hellem Munde:

they call us with a clear voice:

Wo seid ihr klugen Jungfrauen?

where are you, wise virgins ?

Wohl auf, der Bräutgam kömmt;

Get up, the bridegroom comes;

Steht auf, die Lampen nehmt! Alleluja!

Stand up, take your lamps! Hallelujah!

Macht euch bereit

Make yourselves ready

Zu der Hochzeit,

for the wedding,

Ihr müsset ihm entgegen gehn!

you must go to meet him!

Here is a familiar piece, Prelude & Fugue in D major, BWV 532, performed by the young Dutch organist, Gert van Hoef. He became interested in the organ at thirteen and received some basic instruction from his grandfather before moving on to formal training from 2014-18.  Van Hoef has a Facebook page that often links to many of his live performances.

And finally here is the Cello Suite No. 1 in G major, BWV 1007, played by the irrepressible American cellist, Yo Yo Ma.

Bach's music has been a part of me for so long that I couldn't begin to tell you when I first heard it other than to say it had to be in church at a very early age. The preludes. fugues, harmonies, the shear wonder of his work, it's all in my blood. And I can't play a single note of it. Wouldn't have it any other way. I simply listen and let it flow.

Music’s ultimate end or final goal…should be for the honor of God and the recreation of the soul. 

                    Johann Sebastian Bach - Leipzig, 1738

Sources


Text:

 title taken from a quote by Johannes Brahms, “Study Bach: there you will find everything.”

translation, bach-contatas.com

National Vietnam War Veterans Day 2023

 

Today is National Vietnam War Veterans Day. The date, March 29. was chosen because the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV) was disbanded on this day in 1973 and the last U.S. combat troops left the chaos and devastation that was Vietnam. On March 28, 2017, President Trump signed the Vietnam War Veterans Recognition Act of 2017 officially recognizing the day. The Act also states that the US flag should especially be displayed in their honor.

Vietnam has left a huge footprint on American society. Our involvement began in 1955. Over 2,7 million men and women served served in Vietnam over the next eighteen years. The average age of a soldier was nineteen. One-third of them had been drafted. One-third of the draftees would be killed in the conflict. After spending one trillion dollars in today's economy the US for the first time in its history would return home without achieving its military objective.

In 1968 I had not yet formed a strong opposition to our nation's war against communist influence in Vietnam. My focus that summer targeted a new and narrow direction in behavioral studies involving geography, cartography and psychology. By early 1969 with no end in sight for what appeared to be a hopeless and seemingly endless struggle many friends immersed themselves in opposition to the war. I watched from the sidelines until my closest friend, a promising mathematician, elected to leave the country rather than face the increasingly troubling national crisis unfolding on the home front.

The day before he left he asked if I could drive him to his family home in the idyllic farm country near Emmitsburg, Maryland. He wanted to say "good-bye" to his family. For an hour I sat alone and still in an overstuffed chair in a comfortable, dimly lit parlor straight out of 1910. I heard them talking quietly in the distance. Sometimes I still hear them. On the return to Washington not a word was shared between us. It remains one of my strangest and darkest days. It was also the last day of my support for a military solution in Vietnam. The following day, Dave and his girlfriend left for Canada. I never heard from them again.

To the best of my knowledge, all but one of my classmates and friends who served in Vietnam survived. They returned to a conflicted nation that wanted so hard to forget the war that they often forgot the soldier. It's taken all of us a long time to correct that oversight. The average age of a Vietnam veteran is 68. It's well beyond time to thank them, to talk to their family members, and to donate to organizations that support them.

Today I look back on those memories of military parades, memorial activities of my childhood, and a career infused with military history from the colonial wars through Vietnam. I'll never experience how military service shapes a person inside but I know the cost of freedom is not free. Every Vietnam veteran has paid a price that enables us to enjoy life in this bountiful nation. I offer up to all of them my sincerest admiration and thanks on this, their day.

He Helped Put The Roar In The Roaring Twenties

 

We've had quite a few significant musical birthdays this week. The honor today is reserved for "The King of Jazz," Paul Whiteman. A strong-willed innovator and perfectionist, he became the most popular band leader in the U.S. during the Roaring Twenties. Whiteman encouraged many talented artists and composers through his interest in fusing jazz with other musical styles. He appreciated experimental music and sponsored several concerts featuring new compositions and artists. Historian Glenn T. Eskew says this about him:

Alert to the emerging style, Whiteman pioneered standardized settings of the songs, capturing the melodies on paper and leaving room for improvisation while making jazz appear "respectable" for dancing by using symphonic arrangements. Whiteman made recordings in 1920 of "Avalon" and "Whispering" songs that inspired Johnny Mercer. By 1924, in a bid to blend the "serious" with the "popular," Whiteman conducted his Palais Royale Orchestra in the world premier of George Gershwin's 'Rhapsody in Blue,' which revealed the omnipresence of syncopation. Indeed, Whiteman's various approaches to jazz gained him his crown, for he mastered a jazz-inflected light-sweet music that while never the hot music of [Louis] Armstrong nonetheless popularized the genre in the United States. From the cabaret to the symphony hall, musicians embraced the rhythm and blues of playing as Americans consumed Whiteman's liberating jazz.

In his most notable experimental concert he asked his friend and collaborator, George Gershwin, to compose a "jazz concerto" for his series of experimental music concerts. Though faced with a short performance deadline, Gershwin reluctantly agreed. In two weeks, he completed the new piece and entitled it Rhapsody in Blue. After two weeks of orchestration and eight days of rehearsal, Whiteman premiered the piece at the Aeolian Hall in New York in February 1924 with Gershwin at the piano.

Today Rhapsody in Blue is beloved throughout the world, but Whiteman is all but forgotten as the man behind the music. There is a backstory here worth knowing. After all, Whiteman gave early exposure to some of the best, including Bing Crosby, Mildred Bailey, Bunny Berigan, Jack Venuti, Bix Beiderbecke, and Jack Teagarden. Many people today won't recognize most of these names but they should be aware that these unknowns helped shape much of the music - especially jazz and vocal pop - we hear today.

Here's an important interview with Whiteman about Gershwin and the creation of Rhapsody in Blue. It's well worth every second of talk and includes about three minutes of music:

Whiteman was quite the showman as can be viewed in this excerpt from the 1930 film, King of Jazz. The film was the first to use a prerecorded studio soundtrack "made independently of the actual filming." It was also one of the earliest Technicolor films.

And we can't let Whiteman's birthday pass without an opportunity to hear his celebrated orchestra performing the popular music that made them famous. This 1928 recording features 25 year-old Bing Crosby singing his first number one hit. Crosby would go on to shape popular singing for the rest of the century.

That's happy music. Tap your feet, did you?




Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
Whiteman photo, photographer uncredited, archive.org

Text:
Glenn T. Askew, Johnny Mercer: Southern Songwriter for the World, University of Georgia Press: Athens and London, 2013

The Divine One Sings

Sarah Vaughan, 1946

The American jazz singer, Sarah Vaughan, known as "Sassy" and "The Divine One," performed for almost fifty years. She was not only a singer but also a magician who could wring a full spectrum of rmotion from a song with her warmth and three-octave range. Indeed she was a symphony of sound. The introductory paragraph of her Wikipedia entry quotes the music critic, Scott Yanow, as saying she had "one of the most wondrous voices of the 20th century." When coupled with the greatest of songwriters from 1930 on I think she could be matched only by Ella Fitzgerald for her vocal magic in popular music and jazz. Thirty-two years after her passing fans still wait for a singer who can approach her amazing voice. I must say that Jane Monheit has done a fine job of blending the Vaughan recipe with her own spices to bring us much of the magic we remember so well. Here is Sassy performing the signature song from late in her career, Send In The Clowns:

That is performance in song. It was recorded twenty years before Auto-Tune and other pitch correction and vocal tuning software could turn tone deaf studio metrosexuals and assorted hotties of any sex into so-called stars. We've come down a long way in what passes for both talent and popular music over the past generation. Of course, there are exceptions but for the most part real singing has become subordinate to other aspects of presentation, performance, and spectacle. And once more I ask the question, "Where is jazz, a genre birthed in the United States?" It is alive in many small markets across the country but it remains a small portfolio in the financial departments of our corporate music industry.

So as the Jane Monheits, Diana Kralls and others keep jazz alive let us honor the memory of one of its greatest interpreters, Sarah Vaughan, who was born on March 27, 1924, in Newaark, New Jersey. For another taste of her magic, here she is near the close of her career performing Misty.

A three octave vocal range, no Auto-Tune, singular perfection.

Sources


Photos and Illustrations:
opening photo, William P. Gottlieb Collection, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

They Share A Birthday, Fame, And Nothing More

They share March 26 as a birthday and the status as literary icons but that is about all Robert Frost (1874- 1963) and Tennessee Williams (1911-1983) have in common.

Robert Frost in 1941

The Academy of American Poets has this to say about Frost:

Though his work is principally associated with the life and landscape of New England—and though he was a poet of traditional verse forms and metrics who remained steadfastly aloof from the poetic movements and fashions of his time—Frost is anything but merely a regional poet. The author of searching and often dark meditations on universal themes, he is a quintessentially modern poet in his adherence to language as it is actually spoken, in the psychological complexity of his portraits, and in the degree to which his work is infused with layers of ambiguity and irony

Read the full article here.

Tennessee Williams in 1964

The Public Broadcasting Service's American Masters series online biography of Williams opens with this paragraph:

He was brilliant and prolific, breathing life and passion into such memorable characters as Blanche DuBois and Stanley Kowalski in his critically acclaimed A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE. And like them, he was troubled and self-destructive, an abuser of alcohol and drugs. He was awarded four Drama Critic Circle Awards, two Pulitzer Prizes and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He was derided by critics and blacklisted by Roman Catholic Cardinal Spellman, who condemned one of his scripts as “revolting, deplorable, morally repellent, offensive to Christian standards of decency.” He was Tennessee Williams, one of the greatest playwrights in American history.

The full article on Williams is available here.


Frost left us with "The Road Not Taken," "The Gift Outright," "After Apple Picking," "Nothing Gold Can Stay," "Fire and Ice," "Mending Wall," and many more poems that we heard even in elementary school.

Williams contributed The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, Summer and Smoke, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Sweet Bird of Youth, The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore, and scores of other works. For most of us those titles were reserved for adulthood.

Today Frost and Williams are bound by a birthday and that's about as close as we'll ever find them. Together their American experience may be so broad as to admit no exception. Let the research begin!



Sources:


Photos and Illustrations:
Frost photo, Frank Palumbo, World Telegraph, Library of Congress, New York-World Telegraph and Sun Collection;
Williams photo, Orlando Fernandez, World Telegraph, Library of Congress, New York-World Telegraph and Sun Collection

The South, The Grotesque, And The Visions Of Flannery O'Connor

One of the most significant writers in America, Flannery O'Connor, was born on March 25 in Savannah, Georgia, in 1925. She spent her early childhood as a devout Catholic there in a home just off Lafayette Square. The square features moss-draped live oaks, colorful azaleas, and an abundance of birds, all sitting in the shadows of the towering spires of the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. Things haven't changed much in this beautiful space. It still has its interesting spectrum of regular visitors: fast-walking pedestrians, lovers holding hand, lunch hour diners, retirees enjoying the benches, touring families, people waiting for the bus, runners and bikers, and children at play. And every day for the last 120 years, the cathedral casts its shadow over the O'Connor home while its bells remind the people of God's grace and their obligations as His children. I think as long as you can visit Lafayette Square, say on any pleasant Sunday afternoon, you can know O'Connor well.

Her family moved to Atlanta in 1938, where her father was diagnosed with lupus, a chronic disease involving the destruction of healthy tissue by the body's immune system. Shortly thereafter they moved 100 miles southeast to her mother's family home in Milledgeville. When her father died in 1941, O'Connor moved a few miles north of town to her uncle's farm where she lived with her mother. Eventually, the farm would be called Andalusia, and it became a refuge following her own diagnosis with lupus in 1950. At Andalusia, she would raise her beloved peacocks and weave her experiences and memories of people, ethics, morals, and religion into her novels, Wise Blood, and The Violent Bear It Away, and scores of short stories published in two collections in her lifetime, A Good Man is Hard to Find, and Everything That Rises Must Converge. Her Complete Stories appeared posthumously in 1971.

Main house at Andalusia

O'Connor's office-bedroom at Andalusia

Lupus, an incurable long-term autoimmune disease, took Flannery O'Connor from us in 1964 when she was in her 39th year. You can visit both her childhood home and Andalusia thanks to foundations that preserve the landscapes and memories she cherished. And, thanks to her, you can visit the South anytime by simply opening one of her books.

Many years ago the management at Andalusia removed scores of the offspring of O'Connor's beloved peacocks to the Monastery of the Holy Spirit, a large Trappist estate about two and a half miles from our ridge top home. At that time the area was still quite rural and the peacocks flourished in and around the monastery grounds.

Thirty years ago on quiet evening when the wind was right it was not unusual for us to hear them calling faintly in the distance. Eventually, they were removed and for some years now there has been no call to break the silence. But we do remember those urgent and sometimes fearful calls in the dusk. Today the woods remain a gallery of sounds. Some we know well. Others we may not recognize so easily. Those of us who know O'Connor's work well may find it difficult to distinguish between the peacock, the author's veil, or the rich spirit world that inhabits her American South. After all, from the ancient traditions of the Catholic world the peacock is the symbol of immortality.

I think it is safe to say that while the South is significantly less Christ-centered than it was in O'Connor's time, it most certainly remains Christ-haunted. The Southerner who isn’t convinced of it is very much afraid if not haunted by the fact that he may have been formed in the image and likeness of God. And visitations by ghosts can be very fierce and instructive. In O'Connor's dance with the grotesque her characters and their angst cast strange shadows. The characters may fade away. Their shadows never fade away.


Sources

Photos and Illustrations:

Childhood photo, Andalusia Farm, Inc. Photo courtesy of the Flannery O'Connor Collection, Georgia College and State University, Milledgeville, Georgia.
House, deepsouthmagazine.com
Bedroom, photo courtesy of Emily Elizabeth Beck
Adult portrait, openculture.com


Text:

Flannery O'Connor entry, Sarah Gordon, et al, georgiaencyclopedia.org
quotation from Flannery O'Connor, Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose, selected and edited by Sally and Robert Fitzgerald, New York; Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1969

Spring 2023

Late this afternon in the eastern US the plane of our planet of our planet pass through the center of the sun. That means today is an equinox day: the sun is directly overhead on the equator at midday and the the length of light and darkness are just about equal anywhere on the planet. This year I don't care to get more technical about the facts. What really matters is it's the first day of Spring in the northern hemisphere. Metro Atlanta could use better weather to mark the arrival. Deep blue skies, no wind, bone-dry air, and a temperature flirting with 50 degrees feels far nore like midwinter. No need to fret though as clouds and 80 degrees will be with us by Thursday.

When it comes to calendars and changing seasons, I'm always reminded of the French Revolutionary Calendar (1793-1805) teasing us with the warmth and color of Spring. The calendar itself wiped away all references to the past, the old French regime, and a return to an Edenic world. For starters the spring equinox marks the first day of the month of Germinal. Every day had a name appropriate for the season. A revolutionary idea, I'd say. So here is the revolution's personification of Germinal and her fecund thirty days (March 21 - April 19):

1. Primevere - Primrose

2. Plantane - Plane Tree

3. Asperge - Asparagus

4. Tulipe - Tulip

5. Poule - Hen

6. Bette - Chard Plant

7. Bouleau - Birch Tree

8. Jonquille - Daffodil

9. Aulne - Alder

10. Couvoir - Hatchery

11. Pervenche - Periwinkle

12. Charme - Hornbeam

13. Morille - Morel

14. Hetre - European Beech Tree

15. Abielle - Bee

16. Laitue - Lettuce

17. Meleze - Larch

18. Cigue - Hemlock

19. Radis - Radish

20. Ruche - Hive

21. Gainier - Judas Tree

22. Romaine - Lettuce

23 Marronnier - Horse chestnut

24. Roquette - Arugula or Rocket

25. Pigeon - Pigeon

26. Lilas - Lilac

27. Anemone - Anemone

28. Pensee - Pansy

29. Myrtille - Blueberry

30. Greffor - Knife

Wonderful imagery about the season of renewal in those thirty words. The remaining eleven months are equally impressive. Alas, even the best elements of most cultural revolutions are apt to fail. The French Revolutionary Calendar, introduced in 1793, disappeared along with the First French Republic in the early days of the Napoleonic Era beginning in 1805.

Enough with history for now. May your first day of spring be the harbinger of warm weather and wind in your sails. Here is some beautiful imagery in sound to help you on your way.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations: Allegory of Germinal, public domain, wikipedia.fr, French National Library and Bureau of Measures, Paris

The Gift Of Charlie Russell, Artist Of The American West

 

When the Land Belonged to God                  C. M. Russell, 1914

In 2009 my wife and I made a detailed journey along the Missouri River following the route of the Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804-06). It took us from the mouth of the river to its headwaters at the continental divide on the Montana-Idaho state line. One of our destinations was the very appropriately named city of Great Falls, Montana. The Lewis and Clark expedition reached this same series of forbidding obstacles to navigation in June 1805 and spent a month portaging around them. A century later, the city that grew up around the falls was the home to artist and writer, Charles M. Russell, one of the finest interpreters of the landscape of the American West, its Indian inhabitants, and the cowboy.

Photo portrait of Russell taken around 1900

Russell was born on March 19, 1864, in St. Louis, Missouri, and developed a fascination with the West as a young boy. It never left him. When his parents sent him to boarding school in New Jersey to overcome his obsession, he merely filled his notebooks with sketches of cowboys and Indians until his parents relented and sent him to the frontier with a trusted friend. As a participant-observer, Russell captured Montana in a brief period of perhaps thirty years when boundaries separating the sublime natural setting, Native American culture, and western frontier cowboy culture began to dissolve. In that period his work developed depth and detail and by 1910 he was well-known among art circles from coast to coast. In addition, he had a huge influence on the interpretation of western culture in print and especially in film making. For many years he was the nation's highest earning artist. When he died in 1926, he left a legacy of thousands of illustrations, paintings, sculptures, letters and other material documenting the three themes. Much of that work is displayed today at the C. M. Russell Museum in Great Falls. Within the museum, visitors can see the nature of the Northern Rockies and High Plains and the full range of cultures of those who lived and worked in this beautiful and challenging place. One can see and feel the full range of Russell's personality, from serious to whimsical, by exploring his home and studio.

Russell's Christmas greeting in 1914

In the last century, any boy or girl who played "cowboys and Indians," enjoyed stories, illustrations, films and televisions programs with western themes linked to Russell's interpretation of his experience. Today, he remains a fascinating example of the reality and mythology of a man who lived his dreams, captured the soul of a vanishing culture, and planted its seeds for others to nuture in their own way. And for citizens of the United States, he is a national treasure. For Big Sky Montana, he is a beloved favorite son.

If you ever find yourself in Great Falls, Montana, pay Charlie a visit. You will not be disappointed.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:

When the Land Belongs to God, replica, Montana Historical Society, public domain

portrait, public domain

Christmas greeting, Montana Historical Society, public domain

Text:

C. M. Russell Museum, Great Falls, Montana

wikipedia.org

C. M. Russell and the American West, An Unfinished Work, Montana Public Broadcasting Service

Nat King Cole: Simply Unforgettable

The inimitable American jazz pianist and singer, Nat King Cole, was born March 17,  1919, in Birmingham, Alabama. He spent most of his childhood in Chicago where he became a successful club performer in his early teens. Like many promising performers, Cole relocated to Los Angeles and its booming film and recording industry. His newly formed King Cole Trio met with continued success in clubs throughout southern California. Savannah's favorite son, the singer-songwriter, Johnny Mercer, is credited with recognizing Cole's talent and potential in the entertainment in industry. In 1943 Mercer signed Cole to record for Capitol Records a recording company founded by Mercer, Buddy DeSylva, and Glenn Wallichs the previous year. Over a five month period beginning in July 1943 Mercer produced five Nat King Cole Trio recordings. They were superb examples of jazz and popular music fusion that appealed to a broad American market. The recording sold in the millions, placed Cole in the national spotlight, and ensured huge success for Capitol Records. The songs were: Tea For Two, Body and Soul, Straighten Up and Fly Right, Sweet Lorraine, and Embraceable You. All of them were embedded in American music history and remain popular today. Here is a sample of that history in sound from the trio before 1955:

Cole developed a close friendship with Mercer as well as a business relationship with Capitol Records that lasted for the rest of his life. What a pleasure it is to watch these two extraordinary artists enjoying themselves in a fun performance on Cole's NBC television show from the 1950s:

Cole's success brought wealth to Capitol Records, made him an international star, enriched American popular music music, and shaped the careers of scores of singers for decades. His death at 45 left a world shocked and saddened but the recording have kept his talent very much alive almost sixty years after his passing.

Sources

Photos and Illustration:
Cole at the piano, June 1947, William Gottleib Photo Collection, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Text:
Glenn T. Eskew, Johnny Mercer: Southern Songwriter for the World, Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 2013.

St. Patrick's Day 2023

 

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Today's post could focus on the contemporary experience of St. Patrick's Day in the U.S. - the wearing of the green, the parades, the parties, the drinking songs. Instead I want to look back at the true meaning of the day, the religious aspects, that so often get lost in the worldly celebration. Of course, there's nothing wrong with celebration - we do live in the world - as long as it's done in moderation while we keep the origins of the day in mind. Enjoy.

If you do nothing else with this post, at least listen to the remarkably powerful hymn.

The Reverend Paul Prange, Chair of the Board for Ministerial Education, Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, has this to say about St. Patrick:

When it comes to St. Patrick, truth may be stranger than fiction.

Born in Scotland, he grew up as a Christian but was not too serious about his faith. His life changed suddenly at age sixteen when he was kidnapped by Irish pirates. For six years he labored as a slave, tending pigs and sheep. He began to value the Christian faith in which he had been raised. When he escaped from slavery, he made his way to the coast, got a job on a ship, and returned to his family in Scotland. 

Back in Scotland, he could not get Ireland out of his mind. The love of Christ was compelling him to share with his former captors the promises of God that had come to mean so much to him while he lived among them. After studying the Bible for nearly 20 years, he went back to Ireland a free man, and he never left. 

Patrick baptized thousands of people. He helped to organize congregations all over Ireland, and worked hard to train and ordain men to serve as ministers of the gospel. Among his converts were wealthy women who became Christians in the face of family opposition. He also dealt with the royal family of the time, instructing them in the truths of the faith. 

It is very unlikely that he drove all of the snakes out of Ireland. He probably did not wear green all of the time. But the historical truths of his life are inspiring, and cause us to give thanks to God for faithful missionaries.

Today's music is St. Patrick's Breastplate, a 19th century hymn based on words attributed to him.

St. Patrick's Breastplate

I bind unto myself today

the strong Name of the Trinity,

by invocation of the same,

the Three in One, and One in Three.

I bind this day to me for ever,

by power of faith, Christ's Incarnation;

His baptism in the Jordan river;

His death on cross for my salvation;

His bursting from the spicèd tomb;

His riding up the heavenly way;

His coming at the day of doom:

I bind unto myself today.

I bind unto myself today

the power of God to hold and lead,

His eye to watch, his might to stay,

His ear to hearken, to my need;

the wisdom of my God to teach,

his hand to guide, his shield to ward;

the word of God to give me speech,

His heavenly host to be my guard.

Christ be with me,

Christ within me,

Christ behind me,

Christ before me,

Christ beside me,

Christ to win me,

Christ to comfort

and restore me.

Christ beneath me,

Christ above me,

Christ in quiet,

Christ in danger,

Christ in hearts of

all that love me,

Christ in mouth of

friend and stranger.

I bind unto myself today

the strong Name of the Trinity,

by invocation of the same,

the Three in One, and One in Three.

Of whom all nature hath creation,

Eternal Father, Spirit, Word:

praise to the Lord of my salvation,

salvation is of Christ the Lord.

Our literary piece comes from the opening paragraphs of the Confession, one of two extant documents written by St. Patrick. The translation from the Latin by Ludwig Bieler.

I am Patrick, a sinner, most unlearned, the least of all the faithful, and utterly despised by many. My father was Calpornius, a deacon, son of Potitus, a priest, of the village Bannavem Taburniæ; he had a country seat nearby, and there I was taken captive. 

I was then about sixteen years of age. I did not know the true God. I was taken into captivity to Ireland with many thousands of people---and deservedly so, because we turned away from God, and did not keep His commandments, and did not obey our priests, who used to remind us of our salvation. And the Lord brought over us the wrath of his anger and scattered us among many nations, even unto the utmost part of the earth, where now my littleness is placed among strangers. 

And there the Lord opened the sense of my unbelief that I might at last remember my sins and be converted with all my heart to the Lord my God, who had regard for my abjection, and mercy on my youth and ignorance, and watched over me before I knew Him, and before I was able to distinguish between good and evil, and guarded me, and comforted me as would a father his son.Hence I cannot be silent---nor, indeed, is it expedient---about the great benefits and the great grace which the lord has deigned to bestow upon me in the land of my captivity; for this we can give to God in return after having been chastened by Him, to exalt and praise His wonders before every nation that is anywhere under the heaven. 

Because there is no other God, nor ever was, nor will be, than God the Father unbegotten, without beginning, from whom is all beginning, the Lord of the universe, as we have been taught; and His son Jesus Christ, whom we declare to have always been with the Father, spiritually and ineffably begotten by the Father before the beginning of the world, before all beginning; and by Him are made all things visible and invisible. He was made man, and, having defeated death, was received into heaven by the Father; and He hath given Him all power over all names in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue shall confess to Him that Jesus Christ is Lord and God, in whom we believe, and whose advent we expect soon to be, judge of the living and of the dead, who will render to every man according to his deeds; and He has poured forth upon us abundantly the Holy Spirit, the gift and pledge of immortality, who makes those who believe and obey sons of God and joint heirs with Christ; and Him do we confess and adore, one God in the Trinity of the Holy Name. 

For He Himself has said through the Prophet: Call upon me in the day of thy trouble, and I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me. And again He says: It is honourable to reveal and confess the works of God. 

Although I am imperfect in many things, I nevertheless wish that my brethren and kinsmen should know what sort of person I am, so that they may understand my heart's desire. 

And so I should dread exceedingly, with fear and trembling, this sentence on that day when no one will be able to escape or hide, but we all, without exception, shall have to give an account even of our smallest sins before the judgement of the Lord Christ.

 

Here is a link to the remaining eight pages describing his journey from slave to missionary.

I hope readers enjoyed thia week's posts about Irish culture, especially today's piece on St. Patrick and his place in the history of Chritianity. May you and yours have a safe and happy St. Patrick's Day.





Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
oca.org

Text:

Prange comment, welslutherans site, Facebook
Confessions, catholicplanet.com

The Bluebirds Return

On an early Spring day in 1977 I was hiking one of the small ridges that sits astride the North and South Carolina line near Charlotte. Climbing out of one of the steep ravines and reaching the highest point on the trail, I was suddenly surrounded by thousands of bluebirds moving through the woods and brush. The show continued for twenty minutes as wave after chattering wave passed by.

In the 46 years since that encounter, only two events compare with it. The first was  seeing perhaps a dozen bald eagles relaxing in a tree next to a convenience store in Anchorage We were leaving for a tour and some of the folks wanted to stop for snacks before we left town. As we pulled into the parking lot, someone - obviously a lower 48 type - said, "Hey, are those bald eagles?" The driver said something like, "Yeah, happens all the time here." Amazing. The second event occurred over our patio in Atlanta a few years ago when hundreds of sand hill cranes "kettled" for what seemed like an hour before continuing on their way north to summer in the Great Plains and Canada.

Today the bluebirds returned to our woods. They have been here before, and in greater numbers, but even sighting a few of them is a sure sign of the coming summer. This year we have several small snags in the rear woods that will make excellent housing for any of those birds seeking to set up housekeeping. If we're lucky, they will be close to the patio where they will provide us with hours of entertainment in both song and behavior. Here's an observation I made in 2009 when a pair of bluebirds decided to inspect the housing potential in our woods:

This pair spent an hour scoping out apartments in a small dead tree trunk about 50 feet from my patio. First, the male would inspect the premises, then look inquiringly toward the female in a nearby branch. After a few minutes, he would fly to a neutral branch; she would inspect, then fly to her neutral branch. They would meet to discuss on yet another branch, then repeat the cycle. Again. And again. The setting sun made it hard to follow their house hunting and soon they disappeared over our ridge. Will the rising sun lead them to return and make a home in our tree?

I don't recall if the pair actually moved in. The snag they inspected fell a few years ago. Still plenty of apartments waiting for young families though. Where they dwell happiness will abound.

St. Patrick's Day Primer 2023 - Thursday Edition

 

Bring my pipe and fill its bowl,

That I may puff to sooth my soul.

For it is sure to clear my brain,

And bring old memories back again.

About Irish clay pipe traditions

And from the rich tradition of Irish literature we have this memory:

...I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish Wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.

If you know the author and book title you can have an extra pint of Guinness tomorrow.

Once again the Irish Rovers provide the music for today's post. For the last fifty years they toured the world with their ballads. In 2015-16 they performed their last world tour. The members live in both Canada and Ireland and intend to keep the Rover sound alive by attending music festivals and special events.

Sources


Photos and Illustrations:
Postcard from the author's family archives

St. Patrick's Day Primer 2023 - Wednesday Edition

 

About the "Luck of the Irish"....

Ireland is home to the earliest works written in a local language in Western Europe. Much of that early literature featured mythological themes in the form of chants, songs, and poems. The tradition there is a long one covering perhaps 1500 years. Here is a short poem from our time written by William Butler Yeats, Ireland's Nobel Prize-winning literary icon. Indeed, the past is never far from the present...or the future.

To the Rose Upon the Rood of Time

Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days!

Come near me, while I sing the ancient ways:

Cuchulain battling with the bitter tide;

The Druid, grey, wood-nurtured, quiet-eyed,

Who cast round Fergus dreams, and ruin untold;

And thine own sadness, where of stars, grown old

In dancing silver-sandalled on the sea,

Sing in their high and lonely melody.

Come near, that no more blinded hy man's fate,

I find under the boughs of love and hate,

In all poor foolish things that live a day,

Eternal beauty wandering on her way.

Come near, come near, come near - Ah, leave me still

A little space for the rose-breath to fill!

Lest I no more bear common things that crave;

The weak worm hiding down in its small cave,

The field-mouse running by me in the grass,

And heavy mortal hopes that toil and pass;

But seek alone to hear the strange things said

By God to the bright hearts of those long dead,

And learn to chaunt a tongue men do not know.

Come near; I would, before my time to go,

Sing of old Eire and the ancient ways:

Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days.

For today's music we look to Ireland not as a source but as a venue for one of the world's most beloved compositions, Messiah. George Frederic Handel composed his oratorio in London in less than four weeks. He chose Dublin as the site of the premiere because his works in the past year had met with a mediocre reception in London. On April 13, 1742 Messiah was greeted enthusiastically at its first performance. That enthusiasm spread quickly to London and throughout the western world. Here is the version of the Hallelujah chorus as it was performed in Dublin in 1742.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
Postcards, author's family archives

Text:
Yeats poem, The Literature Network, www.online-literature.com

St. Patrick's Day Primer 2023 - Tuesday Edition

In preparation for a day when everyone is just a little bit Irish I thought it would be fitting to visit the family's postcard archives and share pieces of Irish culture with readers.

About the Celtic harp

About the shamrock

About Erin go Bragh

Here is the Song of Ireland written by the English singer-songwriter, Phil Colclough, and his wife, June. The performance is by The Dubliners featuring one of its founding members, Luke Kelly. Although his career was cut short by an early death in 1984, he is credited with saving much of Ireland's traditional music. His Wikipedia biography notes the "[he] remains an Irish icon and his music is widely regarded as one of Ireland's cultural treasures."

Walking all the day, near tall towers where falcons build their nestsSilver winged they fly, they know the call of freedom in their breastsSoar Black Head against the sky, between the rocks that run down to the seaLiving on your western shore, saw summer sunsets, asked for more

I stood by your Atlantic sea, and sang a song for Ireland

Talking all the day with true friends, who try to make you stayTelling jokes and news, singing songs to pass the night awayWatched the Galway salmon run like silver dancing darting in the sunLiving on your western shore saw summer sunsets, asked for moreI stood by your Atlantic sea, and sang a song for Ireland

Drinking all the day in old pubs, where fiddlers love to playSomeone touched the bow, he played a reel, it seemed so fine and gayStood on Dingle beach and cast - in wild foam we found Atlantic BassLiving on your western shore, saw summer sunsets asked for moreI stood by your Atlantic sea, and sang a song for Ireland

Dreaming in the night, I saw a land where no man had to fightWaking in your dawn, I saw you crying in the morning lightLying where the Falcons fly, they twist and turn all in you e'er blue skyLiving on your western shore, saw summer sunsets asked for moreI stood by your Atlantic sea, and I sang a song for Ireland

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
Postcards from the author's family archives

Pi Day 2023

Today is Pi Day. The day was founded in San Francisco in 1988 at the Exploratorium by its resident physicist, Larry Shaw. Pi itself has been with us much longer. Its first written approximations appear in Babylon and Egypt as early as 1660 BCE. Most of us are more familiar with the polygonal determination for pi that was first derived by the Greek mathematician, Archimedes, around 250 BCE. You can explore several subsequent calculations and mathematical applications here. Granted, I don't understand most of them but their stories are rather interesting.

Archimedes                 Giuseppe Nogari (1699-1766)

Today, you have an opportunity to celebrate, celebrate, celebrate morning and night. Yes, that's three official celebrations:

1. Pi Day - today is March 14 or 3.14;

2. Pi Minute - official designation is March 14 at 1:59 PM or 3.14159; and;

3. Pi Second - official designation is March 14 at 1:59:26 PM or 3.1415926

If you're a night owl you could get away with minute and second celebrations in the A.M.

One could say it's an opportunity for "constant" enjoyment.

If you can't celebrate today or happen to live in a world using the day/month/year calendar all is not lost. You can celebrate Pi Approximation Day on 22 July or 22/7 = 3.142857.

Geek or not, may your Pi Day be filled with transcendence.



Sources

Text:
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Prince-of-pi.jpg
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi

St. Patrick's Day Primer 2023 - Monday Edition

St. Patrick's Day is but four days away. To get everyone in the spirit for the big day we'll feature a primer of everything Irish over the next four days. Today we take a light-hearted look at country and bits and pieces of its culture.

In the late 19th century the Arbuckle Bros. Coffee Company of New York began issuing themed advertising cards in series to increase its business. I have over 300 of these cards that were collected by my ancestors over two generations. The company issued three cards with Irish themes and I'm pleased to post two of them in our St. Patrick's Day primer. The first one appeared in the National Geographical Series and did not have descriptive information on the reverse. The description below was issued with the card in the company's special promotional booklet entitled, Arbuckles' Illustrated Atlas of Fifty Principal Nations of the World [1889].

IRELAND, known to the Greeks by the name Ierne (Erin) and to the Romans by the name Hibernia, is the second largest of the British Isles, and is washed on the N. W. and S. sides by the Atlantic Ocean and separated from Great Britain by the N. Channel, the Irish Sea and St. George's Channel. Dublin, the capital, first mentioned by Ptolemy, is one of the finest cities in the Empire, and is situated at the head of Dublin Bay. A Lord Lieutenant is head of the executive government, and is assisted by a Privy Council and Chief Secretary. 

Area, 32,531 square miles; population 1881, 5,174,836. Between 1853 and 1889 2,289,735 Irish emigrants landed in the United States. 

The great central portion of Ireland is flat, and not less than 2,830,000 acres is bog, but much of the soil is of singular fertility. The climate is milder and moister than that of Great Britain, and clothes the plains and valleys with the richest pasture, procuring for Ireland the name of the Emerald Isle. The coast inlets, called Loughs, are many and of great extent. The lakes of Killarney, three in number, in Kerry, and under shadow of the loftiest mountains in the island, are widely famed for their romantic beauty. The chief crops are wheat, barley, oats, potatoes, beans, peas. The live stock comprises horses, cattle, sheep and pigs. The most important manufacture is that of linen. Other industries are muslin sewing, lace making and woolen and worsted goods. There is a considerable amount of whisky distilling and porter brewing. The Shamrock (trefoil) is the national badge of Ireland.

Our second card comes from the Sports and Pastimes of all Nations Series. I think you'll enjoy the description from the reverse.

THE Emerald Isle from time immemorial has been the home of merry sport and gladsome enjoyment. Its people are hotheaded and quick to resent offence, generous to a fault, and forgiving to a degree, superstitious, devout and easy going. 

The celebration of Hallowe'en, the 31st of October is a festivity that is looked forward to with keenest anticipation by all the young people of Ireland. Numerous are the games played. For instance apples are placed in a tub of water and each in turn tries to pick one out with his teeth. If successful it predicted luck in matters of love. 

Another Hallowe'en game is Apple and Candle. On a stick 18 inches long, an apple is fastened at one end, and a lighted candle at the other. The stick is suspended from the ceiling by a string and then the string is swung backward and forward, while the players one by one try to catch the apple in their teeth. 

Who shall describe the Irish jig. Into its engaging movements and attractive energy is infused much of the national spirit. 

A peculiar sport of the Irish, and one very characteristic of the humor of the race is that of the "Greased Pig." Such an animal is anointed so that his hide is extremely slippery. He is then started to run amuck through the ranks of those participating in the play. These attempt to catch and hold his pigship with their hands--a difficult task. He who succeeds, walks off with the prize the squealing cause of the tumult and hilarity. 

The Irish are famous boxers. Boxing is the art of using those natural weapons--the hands, in assault and defence. To be a good boxer one must be quick of eye, self-possessed, ready of device, agile and good-tempered.

There is no shortage of traditional Irish music and we're happy to enjoy it with this post of The Dubliners's definitive version of the 17th century song, Whiskey In The Jar:

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:

Ireland, Arbuckle Bros. Coffee Company advertising card series, about 1890, from family archives

A Birthday For The Department OF Everything Else

Flag of the United States Department of the Interior

When Congress established the Department of the Interior on this date in 1849, the nation had celebrated a mere sixty years of operation under the Constitution. By mid-century settlement expanded well beyond the Mississippi River across the Great Plains and the Rockies to the Pacific. Virtually all Indians had been resettled in the west. The discovery of gold in California heightened interest in mineral wealth and the expansion of mining. Manifest destiny, the idea that all of North America should be part of the United States, was active in the Pacific Northwest and by 1848 had already redefined Mexico from California to Texas. Indeed the interior had become a busy and diversified aspect of the American experience and one that demanded some form of federal oversight. Is it any wonder that the organization was referred to as "the department of everything else" in its early years?

We've come a long way from "everything else" to a rather awesome department for someone who enjoys applied history, science, and geography across the American landscape. The department's current interests are expressed quite well in its organization chart:

I feel very fortunate to have worked almost 37 years for Interior in that little box on the lower left that bears the label, "National Park Service." The Service has a noble mission carrying out what has been described as "the best idea America ever had." It was a wonder-filled experience - actually based on my college studies - that took me to the far corners of the country in terms of both geography and history. Not sure I could do it today due to the agency's deterioration over the last 25 years but my experience that began in 1969 was a fulfilling adventure. It's one I'd do over without hesitation. So here's a big thank you to Interior for giving me such an opportunity, and a happy 174th birthday wish for enhanced support and continued careful stewardship of everything else.