When I came home from work, Ivi recounted a string of coincidences: (1) she had just finished reading Romeo and Juliet for her English class, (2) today at school, the visiting Oregon Symphony Brass Quintet played, among other pieces, selections from West Side Story, and (3) today's mail delivery included West Side Story via Netflix. As you probably know, West Side Story (circa 1958 or 1959 or 1960?), was a more modern musical (Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim, et.al.) adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, set in the mean streets of New York. So of course (after Ivi finished her math homework), we stayed up until nearly 11pm watching it. Predictably, Ivi got in her chuckles and giggles at much of its 50-year-old quaintness, but we had fun nevertheless. Ivi's favorite number was "Gee, Officer Krupke".
UPDATE, Thursday, March 06: Here is an interesting guide by boston.com to covers of the music (all downloadable from the iTunes Store), which I intend to check out ASAP. Dawn Upshaw is one of my operatic favorites so I have to hear that, plus Dave Brubeck, and of course, one of my childhood heroes, Little Richard -- and probably all the rest, too.
They may roll their eyes now, but I am hoping that someday my kids will come to wonder what interests their dad and whether some of his notions might be worth exploring after all.
I sure as heck don't know much about music or art or culture, but I do increasingly find that music, especially, is almost as important as eating and sleeping in how I get through each day. I just want to share this with Nik and Ivi, and if anyone else wants to listen in, welcome! (And one of these days, I might get my photo blog and sites reworked for more of this kind of thing.)
So there you have it -- a highly-biased (mostly) music appreciation course for my kids.
(btw ... most of the snippets of music presented herein are lo-fi, found wherever, often recorded under very unfavorable circumstances and may be almost unlistenable. However, we hope that your interest will be sharpened just enough to seek out proper recordings or performances for the Real Deal ...)
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