Thursday, December 13, 2007
Nick Nolte
for such a large body of work, he sure has done some shitty movies. but i still think he is one of America's greatest actors.
Camille Saint-Saens
Saint-Saëns' early start and his long life provided him with time to write hundreds of compositions; during his career, he wrote many dramatic works, including four symphonic poems, and thirteen operas, of which Samson et Dalila and the symphonic poem Danse Macabre are among his most famous. In all, he composed over 300 works and was the first major composer to write music specifically for the cinema, for Henri Lavedan's film The Assassination of the Duke of Guise (Op. 128, 1908).
Saint-Saëns wrote five symphonies, although only three of these are numbered. He withdrew the first, written for a Mozartian-scale orchestra, and the third, a competition piece. His symphonies are a significant contribution to the genre during a period when the French symphonic tradition was otherwise in decline. Saint-Saëns also contributed voluminously to the French concertante literature; he wrote five piano concertos, three violin concertos, two cello concertos, and about twenty smaller concertante works for soloist and orchestra, including a colorfully orchestrated piano fantasy, Africa; the Havanaise and the Introduction and Rondo capriccioso for violin and orchestra; and the Morceau de Concert for harp and orchestra. Of the concertos, the Second, Fourth and Fifth Piano concertos, the Third Violin Concerto, and the First Cello Concerto remain popular. Indeed, Saint-Saëns's Concerto in G minor is one of the most popular virtuoso piano concertos of all time, but when Saint-Saëns heard Harold Bauer play it, he said, "That is very good, but please remember that I wrote five piano concertos: FIVE."[citation needed]
In 1886 he wrote his final symphony, the Symphony No. 3, avec orgue (with organ), one of his best-known works. Aided by the monumental symphonic organs built in France by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, at that time the world's foremost organ builder, this work demonstrates the spirit of "gigantism" and the confidence of France at the end of the 19th century, a period that also produced the Eiffel Tower, the Universal Exposition at Paris and the Belle Époque. The confident Maestoso fourth movement perhaps reflects the confidence of Europe in its technology, its science, its "age of reason". He was frequently named as "the most German of all the French composers", perhaps due to his use of counterpoint.
In 1886, Saint-Saëns completed Le Carnaval des Animaux, which was first performed on 9 March. Despite the work's great popularity today, Saint-Saëns forbade complete performances of it shortly after its première, allowing only one movement, Le Cygne (The Swan), a piece for cello and two pianos, to be published in his lifetime. Carnival was written as a musical jest, and Saint-Saëns believed it would damage his reputation as a serious composer. In fact, since its posthumous publication, this work's imagination and musical brilliance have impressed both ordinary listeners and music critics.
Saint-Saëns also wrote six preludes and fugues for organ, three in Op. 99 and three in Op. 109, the most performed of which is the Prelude and Fugue in E flat major, Op. 99, no. 3.
One of Saint-Saëns' symphonic poems, Le Rouet d'Omphale, Op. 31, became famous to a new generation of listeners beginning in 1937 through its use as the theme to the long-running radio program, Th
Arthur Rimbaud
Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud (October 20, 1854 – November 10, 1891) was a French poet, born in Charleville. His influence on modern literature, music and art has been enduring and pervasive. He produced his best known works while still in his late teens — Victor Hugo described him at the time as "an enfant Shakespeare" — and gave up creative writing altogether before he reached 21. He remained a prolific letter-writer all his life. Rimbaud was a restless soul, travelling extensively in three continents before his premature death from cancer less than a month after his 37th birthday.
On the square which is chopped into mean little plots of grass,
The square where all is just so, both the trees and the flowers,
All the wheezy townsfolk whom the heat chokes bring
Each Thursday evening, their envious silliness.
- The military band, in the middle of the gardens,
Swing their shakos in the Waltz of the Fifes:
Round about, near the front rows, the town dandy struts;
- The notary hangs like a charm from his own watch chain.
Private incomes in pince-nez point out all false notes:
Great counting-house desks, bloated, drag their stout spouses
Close by whom, like bustling elephant keepers,
Walk females whose flounces remind you of sales;
On the green benches, retired grocers' clubs,
Poking the sand with their knobbed walking canes,
Gravely discuss trade agreements,
And then take snuff from silver boxes, and resume: "In short!..."
Spreading over his bench all the fat of his rump,
A pale-buttoned burgher, a Flemish corporation,
Savours his Onnaing, whence shreds of tobacco hang loose
You realize, it's smuggled, of course; -
Along the grass borders yobs laugh in derision;
And, melting to love at the sound of trombones,
Very simple, and sucking at roses, the little foot-soldiers
Fondle the babies to get round their nurses...
- As for me, I follow, dishevelled like a student,
Under the green chestnuts, the lively young girls:
Which they know very well, and they turn to me,
Laughing, eyes which are full of indiscreet things.
I don't say a word: I just keep on looking at
The skin of their white necks embroidered with stray locks:
I go hunting, beneath bodices and thin attire,
The divine back below the curve of the shoulders.
Soon I've discovered the boot and the stocking...
- I re-create their bodies, burning with fine fevers.
They find me absurd, and talk together in low voices...
- And my savage desires fasten on to their lips...
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
cruel, cruel man
ONE
BEFORE CHARITY GOT FAT AND MADE YOU SAY PLEASE
BEFORE LADY LIBERTY HAD DIRTY KNEES
BEFORE FOOD STAMPS AND THAT GOD DAMNED WELFARE CHEESE
I WAS A CRUEL, CRUEL MAN
TWO
BEFORE MY HEART CLINCHED INTO A FIST TO FIGHT FOOLS LIKE YOU
BEFORE I WAS MEDICATED FOR HAVING HAD THE BLUES
BEFORE THE LIES ATE THEIR OWN TAIL AND BECAME TRUE
I WAS A CRUEL, CRUEL MAN
BRIDGE
YOU THINK THAT IM BAD?
YOU THINK THAT IM MEAN
YOU THINK THAT IM DIRTY NOW HONEY
THEN YOU DON’T KNOW CLEAN
ALWAYS TALKIN’ SHIT ABOUT HOW THINGS SHOULDA BEEN
HELL BABY YOU SHOULDA KNOWN ME WAY BACK WHEN!
THREE
OO…OH…OKAY I’LL ADMIT IM A BULL IN MY VERY OWN CHINA SHOP
IM A JUNKIE IN THE RAIN WHO JUST CAN’T COP
IM CHARLIE PARKER WITH THE BEE…AND NOT THE BOP!
AND I WAS A CRUEL, CRUEL
YES I WAS A CRUEL, CRUEL
MAN…
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)