Another little musical interlude.

Most of the stuff in my CD collection is typical classic Rock/Blues, but I've also loved real classical music most of my life. It comes from the time in the late '60s when I was about 7 or 8 years old, stuck in the house in England during all that friggin' rain, or just avoiding the older kids that were always roaming the base housing we lived in lookin' to kick my ass. I was bigger than they were, but too young to know how to kick their ass back, so they had fun at my expense. I'd like to meet a few of those fuckin' guys today.

Stuck in the room, my folks made sure I had books, and my sister and I had record players and a set of old encyclopedias to kill time with. I used to go to sleep most nights with a half dozen of those volumes on the floor next to my bed, usually open to sections dealing with the Romans, or Dinosaurs, or the like. While my sister amassed a nice collection of pop records, my Mom would buy me records at the BX that told all sorts of cool stories. The Lost World was a favorite, and Ali Baba And The Forty Thieves was another. Some of them actually came with a Classic Comic in the wrapping. Loved the hell out of those comics.

Ali Baba was set to the music of Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov's ballet Sheherazade. Of course, I had no idea that's what it was at the time, but I listened to that record for years and it must have burned an appreciation for the complex orchestrations of the music into my brain. I still can't deal with watching dudes in tights prance around, but the music is amazing.

When I heard the music by itself for the first time many years later I couldn't believe how familiar it was, and then it hit me. If my mom had sat me down and told me "Sit there and be still and I'm gonna play this music for you, and you're gonna learn to like it, and you're gonna grow up to have an open mind!", I probably would have ignored the whole thing and turned the channel back to the Beatles as soon as I could. Of course, she had no idea ether, but the effect was to widen my horizons.

Of course, I fought it for a long time. Classical music and country music were definitely NOT cool when I was growing up. Back then we used to think that our music was so much more sophisticated and superior, and we laughed at the folks on Hee Haw (dads favorite), Lawrence Welk, and the stuffy looking classical shows on PBS. Hell, now I find that stuff when I'm surfin' the TV and I sit there mesmerized. I guess when I got older, and the smoke from the generational war cleared, I found that I really did like some of that stuff. Kids are so stupid, driven by fashion and peer pressure. What are ya gonna do?

By the time I was in high school I was buying my own records, and cassette tapes, including soundtrack albums from some of my favorite films, like Jaws, Close Encounters, and the Star Wars films, and I learned to appreciate just about anything composed by John Williams. I also loved the soundtrack for Apocalypse Now, with those great Doors tunes set against the whir of the ceiling fan and helicopter blades, and the Wagner blaring out of the gun ships? You can never, ever go wrong with Wagner!

I know, most people can't bring themselves to listen to Classical music. It's too formal, or it's unfamiliar, or they think it's too sterile. People have been socialized to think that it's only for snooty old white folks, and prefer sexier rock and roll, or soul, or blues music. Folks who don't listen to it a lot don't know what they are listening to even when they hear something good, which has GOT to be frustrating as hell. So I thought I'd try to inject some classical energy into the blog. It won't last. I'll be back to Rock 'n Roll soon enough, so indulge me.

First of all, this stuff is NOT for your front parlor and the furniture no one is allowed to sit on. This shit is meant to be played LOUD! It's concert hall music, meant to be played fuckin' loud so that the vibrations from the instruments work their way through your body, burning their way into your brain. It's meant to be played just as loud as those Who, or Jethro Tull, or Led Zeppelin CDs that I love to blare out of the car speakers when I want to get the feel of the guitar and the drums. It's the same emotions, just in a different language, from a different time. Just look at how much these folks get into it.

Anyway, give it a try. It won't last long.

Here's part one of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No 2, played by a guy named Arcadi Volodos and the Concertgebouw Orchestra, conducted by Riccardo Chailly, performing at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

I know, you wish it was Cream's Farewell concert in '68, or their reunion in '05. Well THAT's great music too, but try to see if you can put up with this anyway. Get a beer, turn up the speakers, turn down the lights, close your eyes even, and let this stuff soak into your soul.

I wish to god it was all on one video (why the hell do they do that anyway?), because the person that posted these to YouTube didn't set it up so that you hear the parts from beginning to end. Each of the three sets, for instance, doesn't really end till part way into the next video. What the hell? That guy needs a beatin'.

Oh well, here goes nothin'. This first part is maybe the most famous part of this concerto, and the most heavily played on the radio. Hope you enjoy it.



You're like, "They play this on the radio?"

Here's part two. You may recognise some of this from Eric Carmen's hit All By Myself, from back in the '70s. Yep, ol' Eric ripped off Rachmaninoff. So did Frank Sinatra, when he used some of this concerto to produce his tune Full Moon And Empty Arms. I know, I've never heard that one ether.



And here's part three. This gets pretty good air time too. The violin and piano bit here is the part Frank used.



And finally, part four.



Well? Hope you enjoyed it. if I can find some Claude Debussy or Ralph Vaughan Williams on this thing, you may have to one day endure some of their stuff too. Then again, I might just throw some old Buck Owens or Ray Price at you, so pay attention. We'll see how open your minds really are. Later.