The Session >> Discussions >> Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
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Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Though relatively new to the board I've witnessed some interesting and thought-provoking discussions - some of them particularly well informed - Mix O'Lydian and the Dorian chords spring to mind. So, in a bid to bring together two great loves - music and literature - do haunters of the mustard board have favourite poems that address music? For me the Fiddler of Dooney is close to the top of the list. I'm sure others can do better - you're such an erudite lot.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Shameless displays abound:
Silver and Gold
I'm gonna go out dancin' every night
I'm gonna see all the city lights
I'll do everything silver and gold
I got to hurry up before I grow too old
I'm gonna take a trip around the world
I'm gonna kiss all the pretty girls
And do everything silver and gold
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
Oh I do a lotta things I know is wrong
Hope I'm forgiven before I'm gone
It'll take a lotta prayers to save my soul
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
I'm gonna take a trip around the world
Gonna kiss all the pretty girls
Who do everything silver and gold
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
I'm gonna go out dancin' every night
I'm gonna see all your city lights
I'm gonna do everything silver and gold
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Love that last phrase:
"....give back to us what once you gave:
The imagination that we spurned and crave."
As one who has spent far too many years exercising the left brain, trying to solve conflict in the M-E (with llig and BB perhaps), I'm increasingly focusing on recreating my poor derided imagination.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Funny. I've been a member of several types of musical communities in my brief 44 years; rock, country, ska, reggae, blues, jazz - but no group of musicians I have ever been associated with is as well-read and knowledgeable as session folk. I have had conversations about every conceivable topic with trad players and ever one of them knows a little something about everything.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"Never too old..."
Yep, and I've spent a LOT of time (way too much time) with the "timeless" poets (like the afore mentioned Yeats and Stevens--philosophers too)--love them and MANY more, but I keep coming back to Joe Strummer... Joe freakin' Strummer. Weird ain't it?!?
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
how long have you been collecting those feardearg? I couldn't come up with a single one. There's a dance-related poem I like by Theodore Roethke called "My Papa's Waltz"
The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death;
Such waltzing was not easy.
We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.
The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.
You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
airport, I have been collecting them from here and there for a couple of years as I come across them.
I know that real poets learn poetry by ear, but I thought I would put them down using apexes, counters, spurs, bars, brackets, serifs, tails ,arms, beaks, ascenders, links, bowls, ears, descenders, loops, cross-strokes and hairlines. But don't let that lead you down the dark path. You really can't recite the poetry as written. It should be taken only as a guide.
Be sure to find out what is the national origin of the poet. You really can't present the the poem correctly unless you are from that location. There are language issues, especially the rhyming parts.
Lastly, don't be caught performing. And especially don't let anyone take those words upon their lips until.......
I better stop.
I will be adding your wonderful poem to my collection. Thanks, airport
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Great collection FD.
I'd argue that rocksteady, ska and reggae also have their roots deep down in R&B. The same themes appear in the lyrics - alienation, poverty, exploitation. Strummer followed a well-trodden path. He did it well.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
mehitabel would sell her soul for
a plate of fish any day i told her i thought
you were going to say you were
the favorite wife of the emperor
valerian he was some cat nip eh
mehitabel but she did not get me
(mehitabel was once cleopatra by Don Marquis, 1927)
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
You said it , Al. The tone needs a bit of a lift from dodgy limericks...
THE BALLAD SINGER (To Al O'Donnell)
(Archie Fisher - 1968)
I watched a piper take the wind that blew around his hair
And with the supple leather
lead the hard black wood and brittle reed
A dance into the air
I watched a boy that stood with men
A whistle at his tongue
Breathe the old and smoky air into his breast
then with careful fingers
Make it young
I saw a chin rest on a fiddle
And watched the fingers dance
Letting the notes slip from the strings into the wind
that takes all things
That music leaves to chance
I heard the singer read the wind
And listened to his song
That told of all the wind had known
and when and where the wind had blown
And why he'd been so long.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"I wish I could write you a melody so plain
that would hold you, dear lady, from going insane
that would ease you and cool you and cease the pain
of your useless and pointless knowledge"
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
I wrote this poem a few years ago on behalf of drummers. The poem speaks for itself.
I’m thinking its time we remembered and give credit where credit is due,
To the man on the fringe of the music, who taps out a rhythm or two.
He sits at the edge of the session, and fills in the bars with a beat,
Be it jazz, blues or trad, that your playing, his para diddles sound like a treat.
Now, I don’t mean the one handed drummer, who gives the auld Bodhran a whack,
I mean the two handed variety who swings along just for the crack.
He taps out his rolls and his flim flams, and throws in a few nifty tricks,
Your heart wants your feet to start dancing, when you hear a good man on the sticks.
There are Bodhran players born by the dozen, who play the same bumpity bump,
And if the tune’s not a reel or a hornpipe, they come to a halt with a thump.
But God gave you two hands to drum with, so use them to tap out some licks,
You can play on a table or ashtray, and work wonders with one pair of sticks.
Now you don’t need a drum kit to play on, when any hard surface will do
And it’s more than a load of old banging, the timing is perfect and true
So get him to show you his talent and I’m sure that your fortunes will mix
You’ll all blend together quite nicely, yourselves and the man with the sticks
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
A song, sure, but what is a song but poetry set to a tune?
"The Pub Musician's Complaint"
Say two Acts of Contrition for the poor pub musician,
If I have a son it's one thing he won't be.
For he's to put up with trickies, chancies and shysters,
And publicans dropping ten quid of the fee,
But the worst of them all, is that drunken old know-all,
That musical expert and self-made MC.
So if you've any notion to make a commotion,
I pray now attention you'll pay unto me.
(Chorus)
So come all ye fleadh ceol boys I do things my way,
I do what I want when I sing and I play.
If this you don't like, then get up on your bike,
For it's equal to me if you go or you stay.
Now we're sitting down here and we're having a few tunes,
It's the grandest old session that I've seen in years.
But as God as my witness there be some ignorant moron,
And in no time at all he'll be all bored to tears.
With his "Won't you play this one?" and "Can't you play that one?"
"Play some piece of rock and we'll liven this place!"
But says I "You old gobsh*te, you wouldn't know rock,
If it jumped up and clocked you straight into your face."
Chorus
This same individual won't be there when you've started,
But he'll surely be there when you've finished your stint.
For he's already closed all the other locations,
And only comes in when he can't get more drink.
He'll exhort you to play just to keep the bar open,
He'll sing an old dirge without rhythm or rhyme.
Some nonsensical drivel that he can't remember,
Yet still he'll keep singing the same old three lines.
Chorus
Now every known creature has a female equivalent,
And this one's no different. (The insulting old cow...)
She's as drunk as a lord and singing dischorded,
And wondering why you can't accompany her now.
But myself having manners will say "I don't know it,
Besides the time's gone and we have to go home."
But what I'd like to say is: "I don't want to play it,
Now will you kindly feck off and leave me alone?"
Chorus
So come all ye good people and give us proper order,
When we play a tune or when we sing a song,
For it took dedication and it sure wasn't easy,
And no, we're not making them up as we go along.
If you think you can do it, you're welcome to try it,
We'll pack up our cases and leave you alone.
But if not then shut up and let others enjoy it,
And we'll all be contented before we go home.
Wow! some great stuff here, folks! My girlfriend will LOVE some of these. Thanks!
Back in my piano-teaching days, there was a regular patron of the store where we taught, whose name was Mrs. Butka. I suggested that we should come up with a limerick about her, and one of the brighter wags gave it a shot:
"...there once was a woman named Butka,
whose husband threw up when he. . . "
I'll leave the rest up to you.
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
It has to be the bard himself (Shakespeare) does it not?
If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it, that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken and so die.
That strain again, It hath a dying fall,
It came o'er my ear like the sweet sound
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing, and giving odour.
Enough, no more!
'Tis not so sweet now, as it was before.
(Twelfth Night Act I, Scene 1)
Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Though relatively new to the board I've witnessed some interesting and thought-provoking discussions - some of them particularly well informed - Mix O'Lydian and the Dorian chords spring to mind. So, in a bid to bring together two great loves - music and literature - do haunters of the mustard board have favourite poems that address music? For me the Fiddler of Dooney is close to the top of the list. I'm sure others can do better - you're such an erudite lot.
http://www.irishfiddle.com/fiddlerofdooney.html
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by zepherin
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
My favorite poet is Wallace Stevens, so I'll go with "To The One Of Fictive Music," though it's not really about music:
http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/Wallace-Stevens/4190
Do short stories count too? I've always like The Devil and Daniel Webster for the fiddle bit.
"But the very devil's got into that fiddle of mine."
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Marklar
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Shameless displays abound:
Silver and Gold
I'm gonna go out dancin' every night
I'm gonna see all the city lights
I'll do everything silver and gold
I got to hurry up before I grow too old
I'm gonna take a trip around the world
I'm gonna kiss all the pretty girls
And do everything silver and gold
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
Oh I do a lotta things I know is wrong
Hope I'm forgiven before I'm gone
It'll take a lotta prayers to save my soul
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
I'm gonna take a trip around the world
Gonna kiss all the pretty girls
Who do everything silver and gold
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
I'm gonna go out dancin' every night
I'm gonna see all your city lights
I'm gonna do everything silver and gold
And I got to hurry up before I grow too old
--Joe Strummer
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by GDub
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Love that last phrase:
"....give back to us what once you gave:
The imagination that we spurned and crave."
As one who has spent far too many years exercising the left brain, trying to solve conflict in the M-E (with llig and BB perhaps), I'm increasingly focusing on recreating my poor derided imagination.
Short stories welcomed.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by zepherin
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Never too old.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by zepherin
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Funny. I've been a member of several types of musical communities in my brief 44 years; rock, country, ska, reggae, blues, jazz - but no group of musicians I have ever been associated with is as well-read and knowledgeable as session folk. I have had conversations about every conceivable topic with trad players and ever one of them knows a little something about everything.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Jusa Nutter Eejit
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"Funny...."
Ditto!!
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by GDub
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"Never too old..."
Yep, and I've spent a LOT of time (way too much time) with the "timeless" poets (like the afore mentioned Yeats and Stevens--philosophers too)--love them and MANY more, but I keep coming back to Joe Strummer... Joe freakin' Strummer. Weird ain't it?!?
Whatever gets yer goat...
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by GDub
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
OK. Wallace Stevens... "The Man With the Blue Guitar"...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pfc2j5jRxwE
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by GDub
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Strummer's good. His stuff roots straight back into folk and blues. He could tell a great story.
'No man borne with a living soul, can be working for the clampdown."
Now where've we heard that before...
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by zepherin
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Strummer... Blues? Rocksteady/Reggae is the root (with a hint of Ska)
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by GDub
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
I have collected a bunch of great tune related poetry on my website at:
http://www.SessioNite.com
Look down the right side of the page.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by feardearg
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
how long have you been collecting those feardearg? I couldn't come up with a single one. There's a dance-related poem I like by Theodore Roethke called "My Papa's Waltz"
The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy dizzy;
But I hung on like death;
Such waltzing was not easy.
We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown itself.
The hand that held my wrist
Was battered on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a buckle.
You beat time on my head
With a palm caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to your shirt.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by airport
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Shameless displays abound:
Silver and Gold
HELL YEAH!
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Fishmonger
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
airport, I have been collecting them from here and there for a couple of years as I come across them.
I know that real poets learn poetry by ear, but I thought I would put them down using apexes, counters, spurs, bars, brackets, serifs, tails ,arms, beaks, ascenders, links, bowls, ears, descenders, loops, cross-strokes and hairlines. But don't let that lead you down the dark path. You really can't recite the poetry as written. It should be taken only as a guide.
Be sure to find out what is the national origin of the poet. You really can't present the the poem correctly unless you are from that location. There are language issues, especially the rhyming parts.
Lastly, don't be caught performing. And especially don't let anyone take those words upon their lips until.......
I better stop.
I will be adding your wonderful poem to my collection. Thanks, airport
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by feardearg
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Great collection FD.
I'd argue that rocksteady, ska and reggae also have their roots deep down in R&B. The same themes appear in the lyrics - alienation, poverty, exploitation. Strummer followed a well-trodden path. He did it well.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by zepherin
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Feardearg - is there music to Green among the Gold? I feel I should know it but can't dredge it up from the wetware.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by zepherin
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
the tunes' greatest strength is that they are not words.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by ...
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
mehitabel would sell her soul for
a plate of fish any day i told her i thought
you were going to say you were
the favorite wife of the emperor
valerian he was some cat nip eh
mehitabel but she did not get me
(mehitabel was once cleopatra by Don Marquis, 1927)
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by mehitabel23
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"There once was a girl from Nantucket..."
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Reverend
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
http://www.patdrummond.net/Lyrics/Through_The_Cracks/The_Buskers_Waltz.html
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Clear Drops
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"Who's favourites were Fr Ted and Samuel Beckett..."
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by ...
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"but the shock of Ted's "Feck it"... "
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by ...
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"made Beckett kick the bucket ..."
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by ...
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"And they fell over the ceilidhe band's drum kit!"
Pretty lame, I know, but there is only so much you can get past the language filters around here!
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by AlBrown
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
You said it , Al. The tone needs a bit of a lift from dodgy limericks...
THE BALLAD SINGER (To Al O'Donnell)
(Archie Fisher - 1968)
I watched a piper take the wind that blew around his hair
And with the supple leather
lead the hard black wood and brittle reed
A dance into the air
I watched a boy that stood with men
A whistle at his tongue
Breathe the old and smoky air into his breast
then with careful fingers
Make it young
I saw a chin rest on a fiddle
And watched the fingers dance
Letting the notes slip from the strings into the wind
that takes all things
That music leaves to chance
I heard the singer read the wind
And listened to his song
That told of all the wind had known
and when and where the wind had blown
And why he'd been so long.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by cabers
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
There's another for your collection Feardearg.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by cabers
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"I wish I could write you a melody so plain
that would hold you, dear lady, from going insane
that would ease you and cool you and cease the pain
of your useless and pointless knowledge"
Bob Dylan
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Shepshed
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
"is there music to Green among the Gold? "
I haven't been able to find it either.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by feardearg
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
I wrote this poem a few years ago on behalf of drummers. The poem speaks for itself.
I’m thinking its time we remembered and give credit where credit is due,
To the man on the fringe of the music, who taps out a rhythm or two.
He sits at the edge of the session, and fills in the bars with a beat,
Be it jazz, blues or trad, that your playing, his para diddles sound like a treat.
Now, I don’t mean the one handed drummer, who gives the auld Bodhran a whack,
I mean the two handed variety who swings along just for the crack.
He taps out his rolls and his flim flams, and throws in a few nifty tricks,
Your heart wants your feet to start dancing, when you hear a good man on the sticks.
There are Bodhran players born by the dozen, who play the same bumpity bump,
And if the tune’s not a reel or a hornpipe, they come to a halt with a thump.
But God gave you two hands to drum with, so use them to tap out some licks,
You can play on a table or ashtray, and work wonders with one pair of sticks.
Now you don’t need a drum kit to play on, when any hard surface will do
And it’s more than a load of old banging, the timing is perfect and true
So get him to show you his talent and I’m sure that your fortunes will mix
You’ll all blend together quite nicely, yourselves and the man with the sticks
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Free Reed
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
A song, sure, but what is a song but poetry set to a tune?
"The Pub Musician's Complaint"
Say two Acts of Contrition for the poor pub musician,
If I have a son it's one thing he won't be.
For he's to put up with trickies, chancies and shysters,
And publicans dropping ten quid of the fee,
But the worst of them all, is that drunken old know-all,
That musical expert and self-made MC.
So if you've any notion to make a commotion,
I pray now attention you'll pay unto me.
(Chorus)
So come all ye fleadh ceol boys I do things my way,
I do what I want when I sing and I play.
If this you don't like, then get up on your bike,
For it's equal to me if you go or you stay.
Now we're sitting down here and we're having a few tunes,
It's the grandest old session that I've seen in years.
But as God as my witness there be some ignorant moron,
And in no time at all he'll be all bored to tears.
With his "Won't you play this one?" and "Can't you play that one?"
"Play some piece of rock and we'll liven this place!"
But says I "You old gobsh*te, you wouldn't know rock,
If it jumped up and clocked you straight into your face."
Chorus
This same individual won't be there when you've started,
But he'll surely be there when you've finished your stint.
For he's already closed all the other locations,
And only comes in when he can't get more drink.
He'll exhort you to play just to keep the bar open,
He'll sing an old dirge without rhythm or rhyme.
Some nonsensical drivel that he can't remember,
Yet still he'll keep singing the same old three lines.
Chorus
Now every known creature has a female equivalent,
And this one's no different. (The insulting old cow...)
She's as drunk as a lord and singing dischorded,
And wondering why you can't accompany her now.
But myself having manners will say "I don't know it,
Besides the time's gone and we have to go home."
But what I'd like to say is: "I don't want to play it,
Now will you kindly feck off and leave me alone?"
Chorus
So come all ye good people and give us proper order,
When we play a tune or when we sing a song,
For it took dedication and it sure wasn't easy,
And no, we're not making them up as we go along.
If you think you can do it, you're welcome to try it,
We'll pack up our cases and leave you alone.
But if not then shut up and let others enjoy it,
And we'll all be contented before we go home.
Chorus
"The Pub Musician's Complaint" by Don Murphy
http://www.irishmusicreview.com/sexsca.htm
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by SWFL Fiddler
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Here's part of Moya Cannon's poem 'Between the Jigs and the Reels'.
'The rhythm of Cooley’s accordion which could open the heart of a stone.
John Doherty’s dark reels and the tunes that the sea taught him.
The high parts of the road and the underworlds which only music and love can brave
To bring us back to our senses and on beyond.'
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by MacCruiskeen
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Green Among the Gold- '..Irish hands have woven strands of green among the gold' ?
Sean Keane, ''Turn a Phrase,' cassette tape. Brilliant song.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by mellow yellow
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Session etiquette in early c20 urban Greece:
"When the hash-pipe is smoking,
You're not to say a word:
Look around you, see the scumbags,
They're all chilling out...
When the baglama plays,
Get a hubble-bubble on the go for us,
So we can all get out of our heads -
Even if we've got to be bloody careful with it:
NO-one's got to see us
Or pin anything on us! - Else
They'll march us all off to jail
Given the slightest excuse...
- Greek rebetika song, Otan Kapnizei O Loulas.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by nicholas
So much for learning and erudition...
Wow! some great stuff here, folks! My girlfriend will LOVE some of these. Thanks!
Back in my piano-teaching days, there was a regular patron of the store where we taught, whose name was Mrs. Butka. I suggested that we should come up with a limerick about her, and one of the brighter wags gave it a shot:
"...there once was a woman named Butka,
whose husband threw up when he. . . "
I'll leave the rest up to you.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by tomw
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Many poems have become songs, "Dawning of the Day" and "Sally Gardens" to start with.
I confess to liking my old friend Paul Muldoon, a friend from college days. I know he looks a lot older than me.
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by bodhran bliss
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Huh?
Bwuhrrp! S'cuz me...
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by ceolachan
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
Whazzat? Der! See! Der, moovin' cross duh scween... Ohhh, sss'uh f'k'n mawth...
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by ceolachan
Re: Shameless displays of learning and erudition welcome here.
It has to be the bard himself (Shakespeare) does it not?
If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it, that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken and so die.
That strain again, It hath a dying fall,
It came o'er my ear like the sweet sound
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing, and giving odour.
Enough, no more!
'Tis not so sweet now, as it was before.
(Twelfth Night Act I, Scene 1)
# Posted on August 5th 2008 by Mix O'Lydian