When I’m 64…
Will you still need me? Will you still feed me? When I’m sixty four… it seemed cutely remote to consider being that old when the Beatles sang “When I’m Sixty-Four”…
Music & Reviews
The Godzilla Soundtracks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDeU42u2s2Y Akira Ifukube. If you’re not an aficionado of Japanese film or a follower of Japanese symphonic music, his name won’t be familiar. But for millions of kaiju fans around…
La Bohème at the Galaxy
Starving bohemian artists living in drafty Paris attics in the mid-19th century, struggling to produce their art, falling in and out of love, sharing and suffering, living and dying, all…
As Elvis leaves the building, so do we all
No one gets out of here alive. We all die. And with us go into the dustbin the dreams, the values, the ideals, the culture we grew up with, we…
Leonard Cohen deserves the Nobel Prize, too
News that songwriter Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for literature shook the literati worldwide. Here was a pop icon sitting in the august company of Alice Munro, Mario Vargas…
A little musical Canadiana
Among my collection of many (many!) vintage song books and song sheets, I have a bundle of patriotic music from WWI. I was browsing through them again this week and…
Boris Godunov
I’m not sure why Boris Godunov, moves me like it does, but it has a curious, emotional effect on me. It’s a sprawling tragedy mixed with politics and betrayal, weighted…
432 vs 440Hz: Science or Codswallop?
Canadian band Walk Off the Earth posted excitedly on Facebook that they had just recorded a new song. Great. I like WOTE and look forward to their new song. What…
Kanile’a Islander GL6
What a difference two strings make. Late last week, I traded my Jupiter Creek steel-stringed baritone, solid-body uke for one of these Kanile’a nylon-stringed GL6 “guitar-leles” which the company calls…
Updated Ukulele Songbook
Even though our local uke group, CPLUG, is not currently meeting, the songbook has not died. I have updated it with new arrangements and made a few editorial changes to…
Why Do We Make Music?
Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast, To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak. I’ve read, that things inanimate have mov’d, And, as with living Souls, have been…
Will Ferrell does a mock music video of gangster rap – and it’s a scathingly hilarious critique of the genre
This is scathingly funny. Will Ferrell does a mock music video of macho gangster rap. Man, how I despise that music. As Rage Against the Machine said, “So-called rap’s a…
Stop Whining, Elvis Haters
Don’t people who hate Collingwood’s Elvis Festival ever get tired of whining and bitching about it? I guess not. There’s another whining letter about it in this week’s Connection. More…
Musical Sources
Trying learn a song from an old songbook or sheet music can be difficult unless you already know how the song goes. Many of our group are introduced to the…
Defining Classical Music
I listen to classical music a lot, even more than before since the arrival of the new classical FM station in Collingwood. But while my listening at home is through…
Ukulele Workshop Today
I just returned from Orangeville where Broadway Music hosted a two-and-a-half hour musical workshop this Saturday by Manitoba Hal today (which will be followed by his concert tonight from 8-11…
Revised CPLUG Ukulele Song Book
I spent the past couple of weeks diligently working on updating and expanding our Collingwood Public Library Ukulele Group (CPLUG) songbook. I’m happy to announce it is completed – and…
The Book List Game
In a recent story titled “Neil deGrasse Tyson Selects the Eight Books Every Intelligent Person on the Planet Should Read,” the eminent astrophysicist listed his top eight book titles –…
Classical music matters even more today
The official launch of the new Classical FM 102.9 radio station in Collingwood this past weekend reminded me of my own past history with classical music, but also why it…
Will Ferrell does a mock music video of gangster rap – and it’s a scathingly hilarious critique of the genre
A musical commentary, followed by social and political analysis, followed by hilarious spoof rap videos, and more This is scathingly funny. Will Ferrell does a mock music video of macho…