12-09: Stereolab : Liverpool & London 1999 - Garnett Silk : It's Growing 1992 - Big Walter Horton Memphis Recordings 1951 - James Moody : Never Again 1972

Not shown above: Gottlieb Muffat, José Ángel Lamas & François Leonard Rouwyzer

1770 – Gottlieb Muffat (Austrian composer & organist, son of Georg)
1814 – José Ángel Lamas (Venezuelan composer & player of the tiple & chirimía)
1827 – François Leonard Rouwyzer (Dutch composer)
1893 – Sir George Job Elvey (English organist & composer)
1905 – Henry Holmes (English violinist, composer & teacher)
1924 – Bernard Zweers (Dutch composer & music teacher)
1925 – Eugène Gigout (French organist & composer)
1931 – Marie Lehmann (German soprano)
1950 – Georg Hann (Austrian bass-baritone)
1956 – Hans Barth (German-born American composer, pianist & organist, invented quarter-tone & just-tuned pianos)
1960 – Gunnar Graarud (Norwegian tenor)
1960 – Mado Robin (French soprano)
1966 – Yuri Shaporin [Юрий Шапорин] (Russian composer)
1974 – Jorge Croner de Vasconcellos (Portuguese pianist, composer & teacher)
1974 – Ludwig Weber (Austrian bass)
1976 – Nino Martini (Italian tenor & actor)
1981 – Sonny Til (American R&B singer, The Orioles)
1982 – Paul Godwin [Pinchas Goldfein] (Polish-born German violinist & dance bandleader)
1994 – Garnett Silk (Jamaican reggae singer)
1996 – Patty Donahue (American new wave singer, The Waitresses)
1996 – Faron Young (American country singer, songwriter, guitarist & actor)
2002 – Mary Hansen (Australian alternative guitarist and singer, Stereolab)
2005 – György Sándor (Hungarian pianist & author, friend of Bartók)
2007 – Thore Skogman (Swedish singer, songwriter & actor)
2010 – James Moody (American jazz saxophonist & flutist)

Okay. Now is not the time to panic. Most, or many, or at least some of you, are aware of the problem with our friends over at the place that starts with "Mega" and ends with "upload." It's a serious matter, one that has put a major dent in plans I had for today, and plans that many of us have had for a very long time. And it's exactly at times like these that each and every one of us needs to step back, take a few deep breaths, and say the following words to himself or herself, out loud, if possible:

"I am not my past or my future. I am not whatever story I have made up about myself, and told myself is true. I am not whatever hurts or joys I have experienced, or will experience. I am only present, now, in this very moment. I am the watcher watching, the listener listening. I am the space that the objects in this universe occupy. I am pure, eternal consciousness."

Okay, you can all scream now. I'll figure something out.

*   *   *   *   *

UPDATE: That took longer than expected. But you're all set now. Also, Big Walter Horton is here since I'd neglected him in the previous post.

12-08: Beatles Tokyo 1966 - Uriah Heep Tokyo 1973 - Hanoi Rocks Osaka 1983 - Pantera Osaka 1994 - Marty Robbins Gunfighter Ballads & Trail Songs 1959 - Antonio Carlos Jobim Urubu 1976

Not shown above: Antonio Maria Mazzoni, John Mills, Sr. & Pony Sherrell Metcalf

1785 – Antonio Maria Mazzoni (Italian composer)
1853 – Jonas Chickering (American piano craftsman)
1900 – Henry Russell (English song composer, singer & organist)
1923 – Dom Joseph Pothier (French Benedictine abbot & musicologist, reformer of Gregorian Chant)
1924 – Xaver Scharwenka (German pianist, composer & teacher)
1925 – Carl Wilhelm Drescher (German composer)
1933 – Jan Brandts Buys (Dutch composer & organist, active in Austria)
1934 – Bernhard Sekles (German composer, conductor, pianist & teacher, had several notable students)
1939 – Ernest Schelling (American composer, pianist & conductor, pupil of Paderewski)
1953 – Frederick Ranalow (Irish bass-baritone)
1955 – Jacques Handschin (Swiss musicologist)
1956 – Edgar Bainton (English composer)
1961 – William Beatton Moonie (Scottish composer)
1967 – John Mills, Sr. (American singer & barber, father of the Mills Brothers)
1969 – Vincenzo Davico (Italian composer)
1971 – Marie Collier (Australian soprano)
1975 – Gary Thain (New Zealand rock bass guitarist, Uriah Heep)
1980 – John Lennon (English rock singer, songwriter & guitarist, The Beatles)
1981 – Maria Pedrini (Italian soprano)
1982 – Big Walter Horton (American blues harmonica player)
1982 – Marty Robbins (American country singer, songwriter, guitarist & pianist)
1984 – Razzle (English rock drummer, Hanoi Rocks)
1988 – Toubo Rhoad (American soul singer, The Persuasions)
1990 – John Alexander (American tenor)
1990 – Pony Sherrell Metcalf (American singer)
1991 – Buck Clayton (American jazz trumpeter)
1994 – Antônio Carlos Jobim (Brazilian composer, guitarist, pianist, singer & arranger)
1996 – Jules Bastin (Belgian baritone)
2003 – Rubén González (Cuban pianist, Buena Vista Social Club)
2004 – Dimebag Darrell (American metal guitarist & songwriter, Pantera, Damageplan)
2006 – Martha Tilton (American jazz & pop singer)
2009 – Luis Días (Dominican rock singer, songwriter & guitarist, "El Terror")

That was an awfully popular day for it, wasn't it? I'm sure you can tell what I was going for with this post. Unfortunately, I was not able to locate any Marty Robbins or Antonio Carlos Jobim live in Japan! So you'll just have to settle for a classic studio album from each.

12-07: The Germs : GI 1979 - Kirsten Flagstad : Mahler 1957 | Wagner 1956 - Willaert Missa Mente Tota / Cinquecento 2009 - Clara Haskil : Mozart Piano Concertos 20 & 23 1956

Shown above: Adrian Willaert, Nicolas-Prosper Levasseur, Antoni Kątski, Ludwig Minkus, Adele Aus der Ohe, a book by Cecil Forsyth, Clara Haskil (many years before she achieved recognition), Kirsten Flagstad, Darby Crash, Victor de Narke, Dee Clark, John Addison, Frederick Fennell, Jerry Scoggins & Jay McShann.

1562 – Adrian Willaert (Flemish composer, founder of Venetian School, teacher of Zarlino)
1811 – Ignaz Spangler (German composer)
1823 – Johann Gottlieb Schwencke (German composer, organist & cantor)
1829 – Johann Christoph Kienlen (German composer)
1834 – Ludwig Schuncke (German pianist & composer, friend of Schumann)
1839 – Jan August Vitásek (Czech composer)
1841 – Johann Daniel Ferstenberg (composer)
1867 – Rudolf Viole (pianist & composer)
1871 – Nicolas-Prosper Levasseur (French operatic bass)
1899 – Antoni Kątski [Anton de Kontski] (Polish pianist & composer)
1917 – Ludwig Minkus [Léon Minkus, Людвиг Минкус] (Austrian ballet composer & violinist of Czech & Hungarian ancestry, active in Russia)
1937 – Adele Aus der Ohe (German pianist & composer, pupil of Liszt)
1941 – Cecil Forsyth (English composer, musicologist, violist & author)
1944 – Julius Von Raatz-Brockmann (German baritone)
1948 – Godfrey Turner (American composer)
1960 – Clara Haskil (Romanian-born Swiss pianist)
1960 – Lila Robeson (American mezzo-soprano)
1962 – Kirsten Flagstad (Norwegian dramatic soprano)
1980 – Darby Crash (American punk rock singer & songwriter, The Germs)
1986 – Victor de Narke (Argentine operatic bass)
1990 – Dee Clark (American soul singer, "Raindrops")
1998 – John Addison (English film composer, Tom Jones, A Bridge Too Far, Murder, She Wrote)
2004 – Frederick Fennell (American band conductor, percussionist & teacher, Eastman Wind Ensemble)
2004 – Jerry Scoggins (American country singer & guitarist, "The Ballad of Jed Clampett")
2006 – Jay McShann (American blues & jazz bandleader, singer, pianist & composer)

Really been slacking off. I slacked off so much on the collage, I'm now telling you who IS in it, instead of who isn't. Slacked off so much on Johann Daniel Ferstenberg and Rudolf Viole I didn't even dig deep enough to determine their nationalities. I should have put down Ferstenberg as Swedish and Viole as Belgian just so you wouldn't lie awake tonight wondering about it.

Anyway, looks like I'll be slacking off on this part too. But is me telling you that Willaert was one of the most important composers of the 16th century, or that Haskil was one of the supreme interpreters of Mozart and Beethoven, or that Flagstad was probably the Wagnerian soprano par excellence, or that Frederick Fennell did more than anyone else to elevate the artistic level of wind-band music really going to change anything?

You know... this blog is really for me, if you hadn't figured that out by now. It's for my own personal edification, and it gives me a sort-of fun hobby to work on. I only offer you these "goodies" to get butts in the seats, as it were. But once again, what other blog in the world will give you serene sacred works from the Renaissance and brutal late-70s punk rock in the same post? I mean, fer realz.