Piano Concerto In E Flat, K. 482; 3rd Movement (1785) – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Posted on March 10, 2022 by observationblogger — 6 Comments

Copper plate engraving cerca 1785 of Vienna

Mozart completed the Piano Concerto No. 22 in E-flat major on December 16, 1785 as he was approaching the height of his popularity in Vienna. Almost simultaneously, he had been working on the score to The Marriage of Figaro. This is the second concerto to feature here from Mozart released in the same year. The previous article was Piano No 20 Concerto in D Minor.

Wolfgang Amadeus constantly composed during this successful period in Vienna. Symphonies, songs, sonatas, piano concertos, arias, quintets, quartets, trios and horn concertos. Financially, he was now very well off. He was even able to afford the rent for an apartment in Schulerstrasse, right behind St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, for 460 guilders per year – more than his father earned in an entire year.

Though opera like The Marriage of Figaro was the most prestigious genre of music, piano concertos formed the bread and butter of Mozart’s career at the time, and his performances of his own works were in high demand. Today’s concerto piece which features prominently in the Film Amadeus is the final stanza (Allegro) of the entire Piano Concerto No 22.

Michael Kelly, an Irish tenor who originated the roles of Basilio and Don Curzio in The Marriage of Figaro, left a vivid description of Mozart’s piano technique from this time: “His feeling, the rapidity of his fingers, the great execution and strength of his left hand particularly, and the apparent inspiration of his modulations, astounded me.”

As far as we know, Mozart likely performed this particular concerto at least three times during his life: twice within a few weeks of its completion and again during a series of subscription concerts the following Lent.

References:
1. Something Rare: Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 22 in E-flat major, K. 482 – Houston Symphony
2. Mozart.com – Mozart establishes himself in Vienna

Tagged with: Piano Concerto No 22, Vienna, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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For You (1988) – John Denver

Posted on March 8, 2022 by observationblogger — 6 Comments

I grew up on John Denver music since my parents owned some of his records and this was one of his later songs I was enamoured with. Denver wrote this for his Australian wife Cassandra Delaney who he met in a bar when he went out with friends. He wrote For You in 1986 and debuted it on his tour that year. The song always got tremendous ovations and there were times John actually stopped singing to let the applause die down.

Just to look in your eyes again
Just to lay in your arms
Just to be the first one always there for you
Just to live in your laughter
Just to sing in your heart
Just to be everyone of your dreams come true

The song was released on Denver’s 20th studio album Higher Ground. Unlike the rest of the album (done in Colorado), For You was recorded in Sydney. Denver married Delaney in 88, but they divorced in 93 and it wasn’t a pretty time for both parties. Delaney alleged it was due to Denver’s alcoholism and Denver said, “..she managed to make a fool of me from one end of the valley to the other“.

Denver began his music career with folk music groups during the late 1960s.Starting in the 1970s, he was one of the most popular acoustic artists of the decade and one of its best-selling artists. Denver died on October 12, 1997, when his light homebuilt aircraft, crashed into Monterey Bay, California.

Beyond music, Denver’s artistic interests included painting, but because of his limiting schedule he pursued photography, saying once, “photography is a way to communicate a feeling“. Denver was also an avid skier and golfer, but his principal interest was in flying.
As usual, the associated wikipedia references.

Tagged with: for you, higher ground, john denver
Posted in Music

For All You’ve Done (2004) – Hillsong

Posted on March 5, 2022 by observationblogger — Leave a comment

This is the second song to appear here and title track from Hillsong’s record For All You’ve Done. You can find more information about the record in the article Evermore which came out Jan 6 this year. This evangelical Christian album album peaked at No1 on the mainstream music charts in Australia and the media were interviewing the Hillsong leaders and lead-singer Darlene Zschech (singer of today’s song) to know what all the fuss was about.

For All You’ve Done is the thirteenth album in the live praise and worship series of contemporary worship music by Hillsong Church. The album was recorded at the Sydney Entertainment Centre with production by Darlene Zschech, Raymond Badham, Joel Houston and Reuben Morgan. The latter singer-songwriter I had the good fortune to meet for dinner at the Mornington Baptist church and operate the Computer powerpoints during his show. More songs will appear from both Hillsong and Reuben Morgan as a solo performer.

My Savior, Redeemer
Lifted me from the miry clay
Almighty forever
I will never be the same ’cause You came near
From the everlasting
To the world we live
The Father’s only Son

You lived and You died
You rose again on high
You opened the way
For the world to live again
Hallelujah
For all You’ve done

Some have called it the golden era of Hillsong the early 2000’s with so many beautiful tracks. Someone mentioned in the you tube comments: ‘I don’t get it; where did this style go? Why did it go away? What happened‘? This album For All You’ve Done hasn’t got a mediocre track on it. I can account that these concerts have a strong social atmosphere and a dynamic religious service with upbeat music that emulates a secular music concert.

The Fader web site stated: Hillsong is one of the largest evangelical Christian churches in the world. What began as a small pentecostal church in a suburb of Sydney now holds services on all six habitable continents, with 30 locations and more than 80 affiliated campuses. More than 100,000 people are estimated to attend Hillsong church services every week, including Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, Nick Jonas, and the Jenner sisters. According to the church, for every person attending in person three more watch online.

References:
1. For All You’ve Done – wikipedia

Tagged with: For All You've Done, Hillsong
Posted in Music

Foot of Pride (1992) – Lou Reed

Posted on March 3, 2022 by observationblogger — 6 Comments

This is one of the very few cover versions of a Bob Dylan song which I think superseded the original and I don’t say that lightly. Lou Reed sung this at Bob Dylan’s 30th Anniversary concert in 1993 and I love it. I listen to it frequently unlike the unreleased Dylan version which was an out-take from the ’83 Infidels session and released on the first Bootleg record.

Lou seems to get under this song with a blues riff and a rugged vocal delivery which converts the song into some other beast. The only criticism I have with it, is its hefty duration. Dylan said, that his best songs were always written and dusted off in no time, like Blowing in the Wind, and the longer, wordier tracks he felt weren’t right.
The conversation Dylan and Cohen had about this is in a Parisian cafe is priceless. Like today’s song you could say Caribbean Wind is long-winded and the studio out-takes from Shot of Love were reviewed here already.

Lou Reed said about this song:
“That’s the song I picked to do at Bobfest (in New York in 1992). I’d been listening to it almost every day for two months. It’s so fucking funny: ‘Did he make it to the top? Well, he probably did and dropped.’ There are so many verses, it was impossible to learn. G.E. Smith, who was playing with me, turned the pages. There is a lot of anger here. It’s not the Three Stooges.”

Like the lion tears the flesh off of a man
So can a woman who passes herself off as a male
They sang “Danny Boy” at his funeral and the Lord’s Prayer
Preacher talking ’bout Christ betrayed
It’s like the earth just opened and swallowed him up
He reached too high, was thrown back to the ground
You know what they say about bein’ nice to the right people on the way up
Sooner or later you gonna meet them comin’ down

The 30th Anniversary Bob-fest was a four hour concert and sold out to 18000 lucky basterds. The roster of artists included: Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash, Lou Reed, The Clancy Brothers, Ritchie Havens, Johnny Winter, Roger McGuinn, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Stevie Wonder, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Neil Young, Eric Clapton, Ron Wood, Chrissie Hynde, The O’Jays, Eddie Vedder, Sinéad O’Connor, Tracy Chapman, George Harrison.

Tagged with: 30th Anniversary celebration, Bob Dylan, Foot of Pride, Lou Reed, Shot of Love
Posted in Music

Foolish Games (1995) – Jewel

Posted on March 1, 2022 by observationblogger — 4 Comments

I would have liked a dollar every time I heard this song when it came out and I’m still a big fan of it. I hardly know any of the rest of Jewel’s discography, but this one always tugs at my heart-strings. I decided not to add the ineffectual official video below, rather a simple – song with lyrics video.
Foolish Games is just a gorgeously written ballad and the melody is to die for. It was released from her debut album Pieces of You in 1995. The song details the frustration and agony of knowing that the intensity of one’s love is not reciprocated by one’s lover.

The single is ranked at number 20 on Billboard‘s All Time Top 100 and held the Guinness World Record for the longest chart run of a single, 65 weeks.

You took your coat off and stood in the rain
You’re always crazy like that
And I watched from my window
Always felt I was outside looking in on you
You’re always the mysterious one with
Dark eyes and careless hair
You were fashionably sensitive, but too cool to care
You stood in my doorway, with nothing to say
Besides some comment on the weather

Well, in case you failed to notice
In case you failed to see
This is my heart bleeding before you
This is me down on my knees

These foolish games are tearing me apart
And your thoughtless words are breaking my heart
You’re breaking my heart

Everytime I hear, ‘You’re breaking my heart’, my eyes well up with tears. Jewel Kilcher was born 4 months after me in May 23, 1974. She grew up singing and yodeling as a duo with her father, a local musician. At age 15 she studied Operatic voice and performed in clubs and coffeehouses in San Diego. Based on media attention she received a record contract with Atlanta Records when she released her debut album. Jewel has also had endeavours in writing and acting; and in 1999 appeared in a supporting role in Ang Lee’s Western film Ride with the Devil (1999) which earned her critical acclaim.

References:
1. Foolish Games – wikipedia
2. Jewel – wikipedia

Tagged with: foolish games, jewel, pieces of you
Posted in Music

500 Miles – (Justin Timberlake, Carey Mulligan, Stark Sands)

Posted on February 26, 2022 by observationblogger — 2 Comments

This is the third article here from the Inside Llewyn Davis movie. It was a song made popular in the United States and Europe during the 1960s folk revival. The simple repetitive lyrics reflect a traveller who is far from home, out of money and too ashamed to return. The song is credited as being written by Hedy West which was her most famous song and who belonged to the same revivalists as Joan Baez and Judy Collins. Johnny Cash is known to have included “500 Miles” on his list of 100 essential country songs in the early 1970s.

It’s interesting to watch the making of documentary of Inside Llewyn Davis and hear the Coen brothers’ thoughts about Justin Timberlake’s involvement in the music. They were impressed to say the least.

If you miss the train I’m on
You will know that I am gone
You can hear the whistle blow
A hundred miles
A hundred miles
A hundred miles
A hundred miles
A hundred miles

The pre-Bob Dylan music folk-era in the early 1960’s is not pretty. The people weren’t always the most fetching and nicest people. As John Goodman says in his character as Rolland Turner:

‘In Jazz you know, we play all the notes,
Twelve notes in scales, dipshit!
Not 3 chords on a ukulele‘

Tagged with: 500 miles, Carey Mulligan, Inside Llewyn Davis, Justin Timberlake, Stark Sands
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First We Take Manhattan (1986) – Leonard Cohen

Posted on February 24, 2022 by observationblogger — 4 Comments

I love everything 80’s about this track; the synthpop and corny women voices singing ‘I’d really like to live beside you, baby‘. The irony is, it’s an apocalyptic message and Leonard seems to be playing the instigator of this world transformation. There is an eerie pre September 11, 2001 warning in this, when you read the lyrics.
He said in an 1988 interview ‘There’s something about terrorism that I’ve always admired. The fact that there are no alibis or no compromises. That position is always very attractive. I don’t like it when it’s manifested on the physical plane – I don’t really enjoy the terrorist activities – but Psychic Terrorism’.

They sentenced me to 20 years of boredom
For trying to change the system from within
I’m coming now, I’m coming to reward them
First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

I’m guided by a signal in the heavens (Guided, guided)
I’m guided by this birthmark on my skin (I am guided by)
I’m guided by the beauty of our weapons (Ooh, ooh)
First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

The song has been covered a dozen of times most notably by R.E.M. It is the third song to appear here from Leonard’s ‘I’m Your Man‘ album. It was the eighth studio album from Leonard with many songs having a synthesizer-oriented production. It reached number one in several European countries, transforming Cohen into a best-selling artist. Cohen felt by this time his singing had improved and he said, ‘when I got to I’m Your Man, I was in full stride..I could at last deliver the songs with the authority and intensity required.”

The album includes some of Cohen’s most popular songs and concert staples, including the single “Ain’t No Cure for Love“, “First We Take Manhattan”, and “Everybody Knows”, which was a collaboration with Cohen’s backup singer Sharon Robinson. Although Cohen had earned a reputation among critics and some listeners for excessive gloominess, several tracks on the album displayed his wry sense of humor and playfulness.

Tagged with: First We Take Manhattan, leonard cohen
Posted in Music

First of the Gang to Die (2004) – Morrissey

Posted on February 22, 2022 by observationblogger — Leave a comment

It’s the strangest thing that the first two songs here from Morrissey are from his solo career, but nothing from his time in the Smiths. My friend who lives close-by put me onto the Smiths which I wrote in the article recently Everyday is like Sunday. I soon ventured perusing Morrissey’s solo works and really liked today’s featured track – First of the Gang to Die.

We are the pretty petty thieves
And you’re standing on our streets
Where Hector was the
First of the gang with a gun in his hand
And the first to do time
The first of the gang to die, oh my

“Bullet in his gullet” – fantastic poetry, vivid shocking image. Love will finally break the core of our flesh.

This was the second single released from his 2004 album You Are the Quarry. This single stayed in the charts longer than any other Morrissey song. This song is steeped in the Noir-genre and just reeks of gang violence because of love. Only Morrissey could write: “You have never been in love until you’ve seen the sun rise behind the home for the blind.” We all know Morrissey likes gloomy-irony. I think ‘First of the Gang‘ it’s one of his best written songs in my humble estimation.

Morrissey is hugely popular in South America particularly Chile, Argentina and Central America in Mexico.

Someone wrote on Songmeanings:

Death is an allegory for marriage. Indeed, marriage is death of passion, death of emotion, death of individuality. The image of smashed human bone inspires fear and disgust, just like the thought of marriage does. But when you are able to see beauty in this horrendous picture (“you’ve seen the sunlight thrown”), you know you are really in love.

Tagged with: First of the Gang, Morrissey, You are the quarry
Posted in Music

Every Breath You Take (1983) – Sting (The Police)

Posted on February 19, 2022 by observationblogger — 9 Comments

We are backtracking in the music project as I realised when I was researching Sting’s Fields of Gold that I hadn’t included one of my favourite live performances which appears below. Like almost everyone in the Western-world I have heard Every Breath You Take more times than I care to admit, but the Human Rights Now concert version below of a young Bruce Springsteen and Sting is something to behold.

Today, I was just telling a friend that when I saw this concert on TV as an adolescent with my Mother, she remarked at the end (words to the effect), ‘OK, I am convinced Bruce Springsteen is on another level as a performer and I’m hooked‘. I believe the concert is available in its entirety on You Tube to view.

Every Breath You Take is so popular here in Colombia. It was the biggest hit in 1983 and won song of the year at the Grammys. It was recognised by BMI in 2019 as being the most played song on radio in history. Sting wrote the song in 1982 in the aftermath of his separation from Frances Tomelty and the beginning of his relationship with Trudie Styler. Their split was controversial. As The Independent reported in 2006, “The problem was, he was already married – to actress Frances Tomelty, who just happened to be Trudie’s best friend“.

Sting later said he was disconcerted by how many people think the song is more positive than it is. He insists it is about the obsession with a lost lover, and the jealousy and surveillance that follow. “One couple told me ‘Oh we love that song; it was the main song played at our wedding!’ I thought, ‘Well, good luck.‘

Reference:
Every Breath You Take – wikipedia

Tagged with: Bruce Springsteen, every breath you take, sting
Posted in Music

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