Richard Nixon

sorabji.com: Obscure Classical Composers: Richard Nixon
THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016).
By Sorabji on Thursday, January 1, 1998 - 11:32 pm:
    I occasionally have an interest in knowing of music composed by people who were well-known for things other than music. Richard Nixon, for instance, wrote songs for his college. Leo Tolstoy wrote a waltz. Hitler wrote an overture to an opera he never finished. Nabakov wrote some fairly substantial piano works. Nietzsche wrote some songs. Benjamin Franklin wrote some string quartets.

    Who else is there??
By Jicotea on Friday, January 2, 1998 - 01:32 am:
    Sorry, buddy. Vladimir Nabokov never laid down a note in his life, though he was a descendant of one of the Graun brothers. He.didn't.even.like.music.
    His cousin Nicholas, on the other hand, was one of the Diaghilev ballet mafiosi in the 20s, and wrote plenty for piano. And V's son Dmitri had a substantial career as an operatic bass.

    Literary critic and theorist Kenneth Burke noted down a lot of little musical ideas, some of which were later developed by his son-in-law, the late Harry Chapin. Burke was amazed at the size of the royalty checks Chapin's performances brought in.

    These people were all patzers who didn't even know how to notate properly, with the possible exception of Nietzsche. Better stick to the real thing.
By Sorabji on Friday, January 2, 1998 - 11:32 am:
    Hmmm, it was John Corigliano who told me about V. Nabokov. I told him (JC) about this program I was doing of 26 pieces by composers for every letter of the alphabet, and how I was stuck for a decent N, and that in absence of a decent piece of music I would settle for a novelty item. I asked if he knew about Nixon having written anything, and he said no but that Nabokov had written quite a bit. Come to think of it, maybe he never specified which Nabokov, though I know I've seen a score for some piano sonata by some Nabokov. You're probably right, he probably meant Nicholas, although I can still hear that conversation with him in which I asked "The novelest wrote piano pieces?" And he said yeah. Who knows.

    Nielsen ended up being my N.

    And Nixon, I now know, once played music of his own composition on The Tonight Show. Schmaltzy nonsense, that.

    Now, I should really be working.
By Jicotea on Friday, January 2, 1998 - 12:36 pm:
    Yes, you probably really should. I wouldn't accept the time of day from J.C. without checking. I worked for him very briefly when he took over from Eric Salzman as music director at WBAI, in the mid-60s. I thought his connections with reality were pretty tenuous then.
By Sorabji on Wednesday, January 21, 1998 - 09:37 pm:
    Oh, and Charlie Chaplin.
By C. Berg on Tuesday, January 27, 1998 - 10:36 am:
    Well, John Corigliano -- no, not too connected to reality (just listen to his music...) How 'bout that Great Performances theme, eh?

    No, Nabokov had no ear for music -- nor did he even like to hear it. It pained him that he could not really enjoy the (apparently fine) work his son did as a singer.

    But then most musicians have no ear for Nabokov, either.

    And I too should really be working...
By Jicotea on Friday, February 6, 1998 - 09:48 pm:
    And so should I, instead of reading and occasionally adding to, these threads that have been dormant awhile.

    Trivia. I only know of one Ben Franklin string quartet, which isn't really a quartet, but a little piece for some oddball ensemble in which only open strings are used in some goofy non-standard tuning.


By Sorabji on Saturday, February 7, 1998 - 06:36 pm:
    Franklin wrote a thing for Glass Harmonica which was actually pretty popular during his day. Considering how little music there is for that instrument I would assume that glass harmonica performers of today would be familiar with it.
By Sorabji on Saturday, February 7, 1998 - 06:49 pm:
    By the way, Corigliano did say something of interest once in an interview. He said that kids today will never develop an interest in classical music if they are made to listen first to Beethoven and Mozart. Instead, they should be exposed to the works of contemporary composers (such as Corigliano, which I presumed to be the intent of his discussion) because the moderns are alive and sometimes living in the neighborhood and they command a kid's attention more immediately than some old dead guy.

    traditionally, music history courses start from pre-Bach and work their way through the major eras through modern times. I think Corigliano is right, it should really be the other way around. Instead of sleeping through the first day of music history while the teacher plays gregorian chant there should be something there to wake everyone up. Something like Berio's Synfonia (I don't think I'm spelling that right) or electronic compositions of sampled dog-barking noises. Just something so you know right away this tradition of music is not as dead as it seems.

    Of course you take your chances with new music. What you choose to introduce to young people could end up being marginal or, worse, considered obscene, like that Berio Sequenza for voice. Mozart can get away with "Beat me, hit me" but if a living composer tries such a line it's considered an outrage.
By R.C. on Saturday, February 7, 1998 - 08:43 pm:
    Wait a minute! Pls. to explain, Sorabji, how students (of any age) wd benefit from starting off with 'compostiions of sampled dog-barking' -- or any other present-day music -- & working backwards to Bach? In every history course I've ever taken/they always started from the oldest origins & worked their way to the present/in order to show how certain ideas became established/then were built upon & expanded/or later abandoned altogether. That wd seem to be the most sensible approach -- esp. in studying music/wd it not?

    From the little I remember/most of the European music of the Middle Ages was religious music/ yes? Becuz Church & State were so tightly bound up together during that era/composers needed the sponsorship of the Church or the Court in order to make a living. There is certainly no modern-day equivalent of the patronage system that wd explain how present-day 'spiritual music' -- i.e. gospel or the techno stuff with dijeridoos (sp?) & pygmy chants/ever became popular. And I don't know squat about modern classical music/but I'm sure that the ideas expressed therein are taken from the forms & structures of Bach & Brahms & Beethoven. How can a kid ever learn to 'hear' modern classical if she hasn't 1st studied centuries-old classical compositions?
By Hip dirty old man on Saturday, February 7, 1998 - 11:51 pm:
    See what happens when you git ejikated? All kinds of strange ideas start to stew and you begin to INSIST on imposing ORDER on everydamthing under the SUN despite the well-known fact that CHAOS WORKS. Just calm down and lay back and let it all wash over you.
By R.C. on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 03:51 am:
    Listen, Old Man -- if YOU can't answer the question/then mind yr business. If you don't like the question, tuffshitski -- I asked Mark/not you.
By H.d.o.m. on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 12:22 pm:
    As I have observed in another context, you got a mean mouth on you, lady. Go fry ice.
By R.C. on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 03:24 pm:
    If you really were the person you're pretending to be/you wdn't have repsonded to my question in that manner. You wd have answered it yrself. Any schumck can pick up clues from old postings on a BBS.

    You Chaos addicts kill me. If you love Chaos so much/then go to someplace like Kabul & help them pull dead bodies from the rubble of what used to be Afghanistan villages -- until last Wedensday's earthquake. Try dodging the aftershocks & rendering aid to survivors who probably wish there were dead. There's yr Chaos -- while you sit safely behind yr computer screen/trying to make people feel stupid for questioning things they want to know more about.
By Sorabji on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 03:50 pm:
    e-gad, i'm not about to touch a topic as innocuous as this if it deteriorated in cursing and name-calling this quickly.

    bye.
By R.C. on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 08:17 pm:
    Gee, thanks Sorabji! Always knew I cd count on you for solid classical music info. in a pinch. Considering that I was the one being ridiculed/I don't see what threat this guy poses you. But anyway...

    If anyone else out there wd care to tackle the question/it is this: What resources or ideas can you offer for age-appropriate instruction in the history of classical music for a kid? I found out last wk. that my 13-yr-old goddaughter in NY failed her music mid-term. She just transferred to a private school in Jan. Prior to that/she had attended public school & studied the clarinet for 3 yrs. Which meant she joined the band (music was an elective in her p.s.)/learned to play scales/had no reading assignments or classwork/& eventually performed a few Sousa marches & maybe some watered-down Copeland arrangements for jr-high orchestras.

    Now she is at a school where music is a required course. Apparently/her audition performance was passable. But she failed the written exam that was part of the audition/so she wasn't allowed to join the orchestra/or the band. She still has a music requirement to meet/ so she joined the chorus. (She sings like a dying coyote/but I guess they had to let her join at that point.) And she still has theory & history to contend with in class. So she failed the mid-term. Now she hates the clarinet/hates her new school & esp. hates classical music -- "A bunch of songs white people wrote ages ago that nobody listens to except in school & on their wedding day!" unquote. So her mom called me up last week/wanting to know if I had any old texts or classnotes from when I studied piano & cello as a kid/& what I can do to help. But all that was eons ago & I barely remember anything! And I know my girl is tasting failure for the first time/in a big way. But this is NOT a black thing -- this is about her not knowing her stuff/becuz her public school music curriculum didn't bother to teach her anything but how to read & play notes.

    Her mom is not laying out 6 grand a year for the privilege of seeing her child fail. If she fails even 1 course/she loses her scholarship funding.
    So, I am DESPERATELY searching for a way to help her understand how classical music evolved/what the major schools & styles were/&
    most importantly/how the standards created by those composers have influenced the rest of western music/which is why it's worth her while to pick up her clarinet & continue playing & studying. It doesn't matter to me if we start with Maxwell & work back to Mendelssohn. This kid is family. If she fails/then we all fail. But there's no reason for her to fail -- she just has to learn to deal with some new subject matter. My job/& her mom's job/is to find whatever resources we can to help make it interesting & understandable for her.

    She has access to a computer at her grandma's /so I told her to get herself an e-mail address. Are there any web classes/or even sites/that anyone knows of that teach classical music for kids? Becuz I haven't found ANY so far.

    Y'see, this place isn't just the Dilettantes Dais. Sometimes/the people who sit in the corner just listening really want to learn about this stuff/for practical use in the real world. Which is why someone's questions -- however un-hip they may seem -- shdn't be ridiculed.

    Pls. E-mail me any info anyone out there can offer.

By Jicotea aka h.d.o.m. on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 09:46 pm:
    This medium doesn't transmit irony well at all.
    Nor am I quite such a conscientious character as you seem to believe. I'm sorry, however, to have pulled your chain to such an extent. Please accept my apologies.
By R.C. on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 10:39 pm:
    Good God! -- h.d.o.m. was You, J? Jeez -- WHY wd you reel me like that/& under a pseudonym?! Anyway/no apologies are necessary -- just PLEASE help me find some way to teach this child the history of classical music/without making her barf or making me pull my hair out! All I can think of is for her mom to take her to see Bobby McFerrin conduct next time he's in NY. But that's just a beginning/& it won't happen soon enough. She's not the biggest fan of reading/but if I can find a book that's geared for someone her age/& supplement it with some tapes & e-mail/that will at least be a start. And who invented the clarinet? Was it that Belgian guy Adolph Sax/who invented the sax? That was the first thing she asked me/& I had no clue.
By Slacker on Sunday, February 8, 1998 - 10:57 pm:
    bang a gong.
    who invented the bong.
By (der) jicotea on Monday, February 9, 1998 - 01:36 am:
    slacker: there are moments when your contributions are inappropriate. most moments.
    schwanzkopf.
By Fredescu on Monday, February 9, 1998 - 09:07 pm:
    Slacker ~

    I work at Patent, Trade Mark and Design searchers. One pleasant afternoon I was scanning over the eighty odd years of US Patent Abstracts we have strewn through various rooms of our office and was lucky enough to come across a patent for a device such as you mention. To my recollection, the wording was rather different than your elegant "Bong". I was taken by the urge to make a photocopy of this patent abstract, along with various other "Smoking Devices" (Including one attached to an umbrella).

    I shall have your answer (complete with a full patentspeak description) within 24 hours.
By A on Monday, February 9, 1998 - 10:11 pm:
    R.C. what does she listen to? Take one of her CDs and pull it apart. Find out where the style originated. Find out what type of composition it is. Find out what instruments they use. Trace the history of the CD. It doesn't matter if it's Nine Inch Nails or Yanni at the Acropolis. Do you remember the series on PBS called Rock & Roll? They did a documentary (albeit slightly incomplete) about the history of rock. See if you can get the video or if they're repeating it on TV soon. You can trace rock back through time all the way back to the polyphonic changes in middle ages music. Er, at least I think so. Start out with something she can understand. Have her compare Tori Amos with Chopin or something like that.
By R.C. on Monday, February 9, 1998 - 10:24 pm:
    Thanks A/but she needs something a bit more comprehensive & focused than that. If she can't recognize a fugue or a recapitulation of the main theme in a classical piece/or understand the difference btwn Baroque & Romantic music/ /nothing I can pull out of the damned Spice Girls or Boyz 2 Men is gonna help her.
By Dave on Tuesday, February 10, 1998 - 01:54 am:
    R.C.
    It sounds like the young woman's teacher isn't doing a proper job teaching. I know, I railed on teachers in another thread. It's a pet peeve of mine. But, if this teacher is reducing a topic like Music to boring text memorization, it's a shame. It needs to be brought to life. A couple examples. My 3 1/2 yr old daughter can hum and pa pa pum along with every song in Fantasia because of the way it's presented. I could've played those same songs over and over on the CD player and she may have been able to absorb the melodies but I doubt she would've taken so much pleasure from them. Also, when I was in middle school, I had a math teacher who, every couple weeks, would take a few days break from our lessons and tell us stories about various mathematicians and what it was like to be one in, say, the 1600's in France, what kind of trouble they got in, rivalries with other mathematicians. Basically, what was going on in their minds and lives as they were making history. He painted portraits of these people and hung them on the wall behind him as he told the stories, and he wasn't reading from a book. It's amazing how such an approach can open a mind to learning. I recently bought an old box set of Ravel compositions for piano and I really enjoyed reading the pamphlet that came with it as I listened, and I think I enjoyed the music more as a result. I wish I could actually help you and the young woman find suitable and interesting sources of info. Is there a symphony in her town and are they approachable? In Seattle, the symphony will occasionally sponsor events for kids where they perform some and then mingle with the kids. That's so cool. I really feel, though, that if she or anyone else fails, it's the teacher who has failed and that's so wrong but I s'pose there nothing to be done about it.
By Slacker on Tuesday, February 10, 1998 - 04:03 am:
    (der) jicotea
    my "contributions",as you put it,are always innapropriate,to others that is.i post only for my own enjoyment.i,unlike you,do not require a response to satisfy me.you must understnd that i have an extremely over inflated ego,and any response i receive is just another chance to reply to words on my monitor.
    makes me happy.
By Fredescu on Tuesday, February 10, 1998 - 04:42 pm:
    US Patent Number 3,863,646

    SMOKING DEVICE

    Inventors: Richard W. Kahler, Md., Assignor to surf and Psych

    Filed May 4 1973

    A smoking device comprising:

    a chamber for maintaining a volume of fluid and having means defining a first opening within
    said chamber;
    first smoke conducting means disposed within said first opening means of said chamber and
    defining a first open end means inserted into said chamber so as to extend within said fluid and
    a second open end means extending outwardly from said chamber;
    second smoke conducting means also disposed within said first opening means of said
    chamber and defining a first open end means inserted into said chamber so as to extend within
    said fluid and a second open end means extending outwardly from said chamber, said first
    smoke conducting means also being inserted through means defining a second opening within
    said second smoke conducting means;
    means surrounding said first and second smoke conducting means providing a seal for said
    chamber opening means adjacent to said second opening in said second opening of said
    second smoke conducting means, and
    a smoking bowl connected to said second open end means of said first smoke conducting
    means for retaining smoking tobacco and permitting smoke to pass into said first smoke
    conducting means,
    whereby said smoke passing into said first means is drawn through said fluid and directed out
    through said second means.

    You can look at the whole thing here.
By Slacker on Friday, February 13, 1998 - 03:24 am:
    very cool dude
    thnx
By M. Burkett on Tuesday, July 6, 2004 - 07:50 am:

    In reading Nabokov's autobiography--years ago, can't even remember the name anymore (something, "Memory")--he mentioned that he had a distaste for most music except for the rare occasion that he could tolerate a violin. A synesthete; music quite possibly could be a strange experience for him (Scriabin would have envied him!).

By M. Burkett on Tuesday, July 6, 2004 - 07:53 am:

    Also, Nietzsche wrote many compositions, mostly for piano or piano + voice, plus a few melodramas. There is a site somewhere (had it bookmarked on my old pc) that has compiled and recorded all extant score of Nietzsche's with entire songs free to download.

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