Archive | Music

The film Carl & Jim, by 12-year old scriptwriter Michael Wolfe. Check out the score.

Deerslayer in real life

The actress who plays Deerslayer, the talking rifle in The Whistler, happens to be Juilliard-trained cellist and composer Gerri Sutyak, who wrote and performed the score for the short film below.  Her musical talent will figure prominently in my play as well. And she can whistle loodles. You can watch a clip of Gerri as […]

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from Walt Disney's 1940 "Fantasia"

The Tree of Life

To enjoy a tale of Eternity in the context of time, you have to let go of your attachment to narrative.  Much of the heavily advertised new movie The Tree of Life struck me as a fun romp through a new age of computer graphics, something like the abstract expressionism of Fantasia on steroids. (more…)

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Consensus candidate for Browning's speaker

Sorry, Duchess

I woke in the middle of the night wondering whether Robert Browning could have been thinking of the 16th-century composer Carlo Gesualdo (1566?-1613) when he penned his famous and much-anthologized dramatic monologue “My Last Duchess”. (more…)

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Vox humana

Instrumentalists imitate the human voice more often than human singers imitate instruments. Evidence for the rule includes Louis Armstrong’s duets with Ella, Bach’s obbligato parts to sacred arias (I am thinking especially of oboe and cello), some styles of African drumming, and even some didgeridoo music.  (more…)

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