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How to Cheat at Blogging

January 4, 2008 at 4:19 AM

So....yeah. I haven't blogged in a while. My "adventures" as concertmaster (concertmistress, whatever!), the Three Glorious Days of the Takács Quartet's residency at Oberlin, several blizzards, final exams and Christmas vacation have all passed by un-blogged and un-examined. But as Socrates said, the unexamined life is not worth blogging....wait, that makes a paradox. That and I've just been too bloody tired to write with any of my usual sparkling wit and style, so as a result my blog has been empty for quite a while.

And yet still I continue my lack of output! Here, rather than an ode to Károly Schranz, a nature special on the life cycle of the common Nocturnal Oberliner, or a deliriously partisan celebration of Barack Obama's victory in Iowa a few hours ago, is a transcript of a marvelously weird conversation that took place in the dining hall some time last month.

______

Allie: (reading from popular music textbook): This is fascinating. Hey, did you guys know that Chrissie Hynde of the Pretenders is from my hometown?
Jesse, Joe, Mara: ....................
Allie: Never mind.
Jesse: Yeah, that's not really my forte.
Allie: Oh, come on, surely you guys know something about this. It's classic stuff. Here, I'll quiz you.... What was the name of the new-wave punk group who produced the hit songs "Roxanne" and "Message in a Bottle?"
Joe: um, Marilyn Manson and the Heartbreakers.
Allie: No.
Joe: The Beatles.
Allie: No. Ok, try this one: Who was the foremost androgynous glam character of the 1980s, with his hit, "Ground Control to Major Tom"?
Joe: Herbert von Karajan.
Allie: ..........wow. Let's try something else. Define a rock "supergroup."
Joe: Um, well it's a band that has magical powers.
Allie: Oh my gosh, no. You're horrible at this. Name a song by Neil Young.
Joe: Arabesque for Solo Violin! ........oh, no, that's Jeff Young.
Allie: (sigh) Right.
(Joe glances at book, begins humming)
Jesse: ...Joe... are you headbanging to "La Bamba"?
Joe: Yes. Hey, didn't the Beatles do "Y.M.C.A."?
Allie: No, that was the Village People. Ok, you better know this. Who is the best-selling pop star of all time?
Joe: umm... the Beatles.
Allie: No.
Joe: Alice Cooper!
Allie: No.
Joe: Fergie! John Corigliano! Mahler!
Allie: NO. Michael Jackson. But nice try.
Joe: (looking at a picture in the book) *gasp* Who’s that? They look like terrorists.
Allie: That’s the BeeGees.
-- ten minutes later --
Joe: Is Mr. Fulkerson in the book?
Allie: .....um...well... he's not a rock-n-roll legend, per se...
Jesse: I respectfully disagree.

____

And that's all. More creativity later.

OMG, Mara . . . that was hilarious. Hahahaha . . . sounds like your meals are never boring. ;)
Very funny! You guys are clearly having a good time. Keep the good stuff coming.
This does raise the question, however, of whether or not you are learning anything at that conservatory. I would think the answers to these questions would be easy.
Ruth--they're only interesting when I'm eating with that particular group of people, which is rarely.

Tamas--?!?!?! I can rant, expound and bore an audience for hours with an expository lecture on Bartok, and you ask me if I'm LEARNING anything? :)

Since you are Hungarian, the ability to rant, etc., for hours about Bartok should be genetic.
I'll second Holzman's ranting comment...
(Insert smiley face here).
As luck had it, one of the essay questions on my Music History 101 final was about Bartok. I ended up having to scrunch my handwriting really tiny to fit everything on the page...
Haha, I can imagine. ;)
Mara - your last comment raises an interesting question. How in the world did your History 101 course get to Bartok? Was the teacher concentrating solely on Hungarian composers? How much time did the course devote to composers like Beethoven and Mozart?
...and did We get an "A"?

(That is The Queen's "We", of course).

Also, is that a new picture? Very glamorous!
A-. I was kind of weak on the Renaissance.

Tom, that's exactly the problem--this class attempted to shoehorn the entire history of Western music into one semester. Can't really say I learned much of anything....next semester I get to take a whole class on the Romantic era so THAT should be fun!!

As for Beethoven and Mozart: one lecture on Beethoven, half a lecture on Mozart. I know, it's a travesty--and that after three weeks of Leonin and Perotin...
Three weeks on which non-entities? Hopefully these two were crucial to understanding the Romantics because I certainly could not understand the Romantics after only one day on Beethoven.
P.S. I agree with Anne on the new pic. You will certainly become the muse of the contemporary Hungarian composers.
A-? A-? Tsk Tsk. (Insert second smiley face here).
Leonin and Perotin were essentially the inventors of polyphony, specifically Notre Dame polyphony (or "organum purum") in the 12th century. If that's nonsense, well, there's the minus on my A.

I take it back, we had TWO lectures on Beethoven. Still, lame.

Ooh, so I'll become the muse of...oh wait...György Kurtág? Good composer, but ick. :) (I'd a' been Bartók's muse any day tho...)