One of the mysteries that has been with me for a very long
time is the fact that I seem to have less musical appreciation than most of the
people I know. My earliest
recollection of this was from when I was about 8 or 9 years old while my parents
and I were living in East Lansing Michigan where my father was a professor at
Michigan State University. MSU had
only been for a short while. The
older MAC for Michigan Agricultural College could still be read on the smokestack
of the old campus power plant. It’s
probably faded away long since or the plant torn down. I can’t imagine it was green enough for
modern times.
Somehow my third of fourth grade teacher had let my father
know that they suspected I was tone deaf.
My dad, who loved music and almost took a major in it when he was in
college, was horrified. No son of
his could be less than greatly talented.
He quickly arranged for a complete battery of tests to be conducted at
the University to document the full range of my hearing acuity and musical discrimination. Sadly for my father, his poor son was
only a solid average in all auditory and musical respects. My consolation was never being
pressured to learn to play an instrument.
Even with the handicap of being only average, I think I grew
up as a pretty normal teenager.
Elvis and The Beatles in high school. The Stones, Janice Joplin, The Jefferson Airplane, Jimmy
Hendrix, The Grateful Dead and The Band in college. Not to mention Dylan, Joni Michel, Peter Paul and Mary,
Simon and Garfunkel, and Joan Bias.
I purposely leave out the Buffalo Springfield and The Byrd’s although I am
sure that I danced to them.
But even with that musical depth, I remember the look of
surprise on the face of J Glenn Gray, my Philosophy Professor and advisor at
Colorado College, when we were discussing the importance Plato and Aristotle
placed on music and I admitted not being quite as moved as many others by its rhythms. Gray was a brilliant and interesting
person. He wrote a widely praised
but not overly popular book entitled, The warriors, reflections on men in battle. The book dealt with the efforts of his
and his compatriots at reconciling their morality with their behavior as
members of the US Armed Forces in The Second World War. Gray spoke German perfectly. His language skills put him into
military intelligence but he was always billeted only a few miles from the
front lines of battle where he interviewed many allied and enemy soldiers,
often very shortly after combat. I
was surprised when I googled The Warriors and found the book was
still available today and had been reprinted as recently as 1998.
After the War, Glenn became an expert in the philosophy of
German phenomenologist Martin Heidegger and was his personally authorized
translator. He always struggled to
reconcile his admiration for Heidegger’s work with his actions as a Nazi
supporter. Gray was the principle
architect and writer of a special course called “Freedom and Authority” that
was the College faculty’s response to the unrest running though the US and practically
its younger generation during the 1960’s.
The course dealt with the reconciliation of an individual’s
understandable desire and need to express their individual freedom with the
existence of authority agents necessary to ensure an orderly society. Every student at the college was
expected to attend “F&A”. For
some reason that I now forget, I never did. On some unarticulated level, I still think I might have
greatly benefited from that course.
Particularly given my great respect for Gray as a thinker and an
individual. He was probably as
close to a wholly good man as I will ever meet.
Today I do not often listen to Hendrix or Joplin. In fact I seldom listen to any
music. When in the car, I will sometimes
listen to National Public Radio talk shows or simply let my thoughts run along
with the passing landscape, but normally when on a long drive I will get audio
books including biography, history or scientific titles to play while enjoying
the scenery. I bought an IPOD a
few years ago but almost never use it.
I do have friends that really love music. Mike Bader is an example but his taste in groups would drive
me mad. Every time I stay at his
house I have to beg him to turn down the “screaming banshees” a bit. He’s always accommodating but I do
suspect that he actually likes the shit. Another friend is Michael Savage from Edmonton. Michael has not only appreciation of
music but real talent for it as well.
His taste is much more to my likening and I always enjoy listening to
whatever selections he had on in his home. I stayed a few days with Michael a little over a year ago
and really enjoyed seeing him again.
But even on that trip I was into audio books and not sound tracks when I
was driving from Edmonton to Toronto.
So I was quite surprised, when at home recently, I felt the
need to track down a tune.
It was, “Mercy Now”, by Mary Gauthier. Having now listened to the whole thing a
couple of times now, I think it may be a bit over the top in terms of
sentimentality but its targets are in all the right places and I am still
enjoying the music.
I first caught only a part of the song while watching a BBC production
of Case Histories. I watch a lot of video these days but
it is mostly movies, documentaries and BBC productions. Mostly I watch on my computer, sitting
in the small office I have made in one of the bedrooms of our very modest home
in Reno. My diminished physical
capability and ambitions mean that I spend most of my time sitting in this
chair in front of the IMAC looking out the windows at the weather painting the
very ordinary cull-du-sac at the end of which our house sits.
My room s actually quite comfortable and I am surrounded by several photos and mementos of past times. The photographs you cannot make out. over the chair. are from a great ski trip that my guys from Sprint Canada took me on just before I left Toronto to go to work for Fonorola in Montreal. Warren Harvey and I went heli-skiing on that outing and we both nearly died. I only went for one day. Harv had been the day before and when I suggested he could go again, he had lots of excuses immediately available about why he shouldn’t. He did go however and we had a wonderful day although it ended in a spectacular crash for me on the final run-out to the helicopter. Our Vancouver rep Ean Jackson made all the arrangements for that trip and he did a great job. Everyone had a wonderful time and we also got to connect with our friend Andre Tremblay from Montreal for a couple of days.
I need the radiator oil heater in the office since Mrs. Hansford likes
to keep the house temperature at what she claims is 68°F / 20°C but which is more
like 66°F / 18.8°C. And the 66 is at the middle of the
house where the thermostat is located.
Here at the periphery it is nearer 59°F / 15°C but the heater
provides just enough extra to make it fine.
Actually the whole house is just fine and I really do not need a lot
more space. I would like to have
an actual guest room where overnight visitors could be a bit more
comfortable. The gaudily patterned
couch in the background does make up into an uncomfortable futon. But that’s it. The grandkids are young enough that
they like to sleep on couches around the house and for them it’s better than
camping. The writing that you
can’t read is a sign I got for Christmas that I have not yet put on the
wall. It starts out with, “Life is
Short and Break All the Rules”; so you know I must like it.
I got the smaller IMAC, which in hindsight was a big mistake, but I can’t justify buying the bigger screen just yet. I am hoping to upgrade next year. I am so glad I went back to the Apple machines and am not still struggling with trying to keep the PC free from viruses and running smoothly.
Anyway that’s what is going on with me. Cannot wait until summer when I can get
back on the bike again. Winters
are not my favorite times anymore.
I even see less of the grandkids then as well because Jason has bought the
whole family season passes at Squaw Valley and they are skiing every weekend
which means they are down to Reno less often than at other times.
Since I have such little confidence in my musical ability, I
would appreciate it if you could take a minute to let me know if you enjoyed
this song or not. In any case I
wish you all a very Happy New Year.
My country and our planet need a better year now more than ever.
Warm regards
Bob Hansford
No comments:
Post a Comment