I will start off tonight by making my pick for a favorite piece by Scarlatti, in continuing the list of such pieces by favorite composers that I began a couple of weeks ago. I am doing this at the start of the blog rather than at the end, because when I have waited til the end, of late, I have found myself too doggone tired to write anymore after a lengthy movie review. So here goes.
Many years ago I was wondering about the first melodies I could remember as a child. Obviously I had "heard" music since I was born, but what were my first musical memories? Were they of listening to "Meet The Beatles"? Yeah, learning to work a record player by playing that album repeatedly is one of my earliest memories. That would've been in early 1964. But I think my Dad's classical records preceded The Beatles, because I have very early "image" memories of seeing the record covers from his collection. Scarlatti and Chopin stand out. So does Bach. Dad played piano, so he listened to a lot of piano music.
To cut to the chase, I am pretty sure I heard classical music before I heard rock n' roll (although I can remember my sisters listening to "The Twist" by Chubby Checker, which goes way back). But Dad would've had musical dominance in his own house, at least until The Beatles came along, and so I am reasonably certain that melodies like Mozart's Sonata #545 would've been the very first pieces of music that drilled themselves into my brain. Dad would've been not only playing the records but also trying to learn the pieces on piano, so I no doubt heard them over and over again prior to three years of age.
Scarlatti was one of Dad's favorite composers at the time, and he enjoyed the harpsichordist Wanda Landowska's recordings of his multitude of sonatas. He wrote 555 of them! (holy smokes).
I've probably heard, at most, one tenth of the sonatas, but I love their formality and precision. He was born the same year as Bach and composed in the same Baroque style.
For authenticity, you should listen to Scarlatti played on the harpsichord, but I am gonna give you my recommendation - and name my favorite piece - from a piano album by Alexandre Tharaud, one of the best of the modern pianists in my opinion. Listen to his Scarlatti album and you could basically choose any of the recorded sonatas as a favorite. The album as a whole is a tremendous work.
But since I have to pick one, I am gonna choose one of the most famous of all the sonatas. You may have even heard it too. It is the Scarlatti Sonata #380, as played by Tharaud. Try it on harpsichord, too.
My next pick will be by Tchaikovsky, coming soon.
I did not watch a movie tonight. My recent library searches have not returned enough films to keep up with my viewing habits, so it's been hit n' miss for a day or two, but fortunately I also have great dvd sets of shows like "Ghost Story", from which I watched an episode tonight, starring Gena Rowlands, who - if you have a really good memory - you might recall was director John Cassavetes wife and starred in most of his films that we saw at CSUN in 2016. Rowlands is a great actress, once nominated for an Academy Award, and here she is paired with the prolific 70s hunk Stuart Whitman in a ghost story set at sea, just off the beach at Malibu. I'll not review it, but I have already recommended the series to you, and this particular episode was mighty scary indeed.
I did wanna talk a little bit about two new books I am reading. One is called "Cover Up At Roswell" by Donald R. Schmitt, who has authored or co-authored a couple of previous books on the subject, including the essential "Witness To Roswell", released about a dozen years ago. Schmitt has made Roswell his life, and has dedicated himself to revealing the truth about that event, to whatever degree he can. His effort has been both formidable and admirable, and as one who has interest in Roswell, I have followed Schmitt's writing on the subject.
In his current book ("Cover Up"), however, he seems to have taken the gloves off completely. Here he is interested not in the UFO story so much as in how it was buried by the United States Army and Department of Defense and ultimately by the president Harry Truman, who would've signed off on the cover-up in the same year that he formed the CIA.
What I am interested in, in this book, is Schmitt's line-by-line description of the intimidation of the witnesses to the aftermath of the UFO crash.
I am interested because I am absolutely certain that witnesses to my experience in 1989 were also intimidated into silence that in my case has lasted for thirty years.
I mentioned that author Schmitt has "taken the gloves off" in his latest book, and he has done so by presenting the shocking testimony of witnesses - who would not previously have allowed this to be known, but they are old now - that they were actually threatened with death by mysterious men from the US Army and perhaps the FBI, if they were ever to talk about what they had seen at Roswell.
In Schmitt's previous books, he has mentioned serious intimidation by the military towards witnesses, but not until now has he mentioned specific death threats that were repeated and reinforced periodically for more than 50 years.
These people are diabolical, and I mention the Roswell incident and Schmitt's book because I am certain that people close to the situation were subject to some level of similar intimidation after the events of September 1989 here in Northridge.
I must say that, for myself, I have never been intimidated in any way.
But I am sure that others have, to whatever degree. Maybe not death threats, but something was said to scare them off from ever talking about it. As noted, the experience of September 1989 has not only never been talked about by anyone, but is has moreover never even been acknowledged.
No one but me has ever even said "yeah, this happened".
So it is 100% certain that very effective intimidation tactics were used on other people who were there.
I am too tired to get into it tonight, but maybe tomorrow we will take a look at "The Plot To Kill King" by William Pepper, regarding the Martin Luther King assassination, which I have also just begun reading.
I will see you in the morning, with tons of love til then. We should have more movies coming up soon.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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