I think we are gonna have to go with Claude Debussy for inclusion on our list of Top Ten Favorite Composers. After debating it back and forth the past few days, I just thought that, because he was the author of so many truly lovely piano compositions - many of which exhibit an impressionistic or even dreamlike quality - that he had to be on there. As I've said, making this list of classical favorites isn't as easy as making a similar list for rock artists, simply because I do not know all of the work by any given composer (whereas with rock I basically know every song ever made, or at least all the good ones, haha).
Debussy specialised in piano music and wrote many famous pieces; "Claire de Lune" being perhaps the most well known. A well known orchestrated piece is "Prelude To The Afternoon Of A Faun". His music was exceedingly gentle, in contrast to Beethoven - also considered for this list - who wrote for multiple formats in an earlier and more bombastic style. One could argue that Beethoven was the greater composer. Many think he is the greatest who ever lived. I am not excluding Beethoven from my Top Ten, and he was initially on my list as it was first constructed rather extemporaneously. He may still become my tenth and final selection, but because I love the piano most of all and because Debussy wrote so many spiritually indelible pieces for that most expressive of instruments, he gets the ninth selection on the list.
I am sure there are many great purveyors of Debussy pianism, and I am not as familiar with them all as I am, say, with the players of Bach, Chopin or Mozart. But I do know two great ones : Claudio Arrau and Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli.
You can listen to anything either of these guys play by Debussy, but for my favorite pieces (I can't pick one), listen to "Reverie", "Arabesques", "Preludes" or "Images".
Debussy is not going to pull you into the deepest well of your emotions. He is not going to put you through the wringer and hang you out to dry, but what he will do is paint pictures of what you might feel in your daydreams when you don't even realise you are daydreaming. His music is very subtle and contemplative, otherwordly even.
Coming up we will make a pick for our tenth and final spot, and boy will it be a tough choice. So let's take a couple of days to think about it and proceed with care. /////
For tonight's movie, we were back in Charlie Chan territory, having scored three more Chan flicks during a trip to Chatsworth Libe. "Charlie Chan and The Secret Service" was the title, made in 1944 for Monogram Pictures and starring Sidney Toler as the humble Master Detective. According to IMDB, this was the first Chan film for Monogram, which was the prototypical "Poverty Row" studio. The budget is listed on that website as being only 75 Grand for the entire film. The actors, of which there are many, must've been paid peanuts, but all in all this is a decent Charlie Chan film, with the kind of plot where everyone is locked inside a mansion and not allowed to leave. This approach allows the filmmakers to shoot everything on a single set and save a lot of money. The script is pretty good, involving a murdered scientist who had developed a "super torpedo", undetectable, that has the potential to destroy the Japanese navy. There is an enemy agent in the house who has killed the scientist and stolen his schematics for the weapon.
Can Charlie Chan uncover the killer's identity? Can he do this while being distracted by his Number 3 Son and Cute Daughter, both Americanized Hipsters who want to crash the investigation to show Dad their detective skills?
Chan can. He can do it while dishing out proverbial advice to his children and to bug-eyed Mantan Moreland, who is on hand again to provide comic relief. Mantan is not PC nowdays, but I love him. Ditto the Chinese hipster kids, who seem like advance notice Millennials.
This is not one of the best of the Charlie Chan flicks, simply because it feels like Monogram shot it on the cheap, all in basically one or two rooms. The actors do a good job but the whole thing feels constrained. Still, because it has the bottom-line wit and good humor of all the CC movies, and because the mystery plays out to the very end, I will give it Two Thumbs Up on it's own merits, with the caveat that there are better Charlie Chan films out there. /////
That is more or less all I know for tonight. I just finished the Roswell book, and I must commend author Don Schmitt on his dedication to the subject. With this book, he has pulled up all the truth that is currently available on the subject of Roswell. He has put together a probable timeline of events, which will surprise you in it's detail.
See you in the morning. Huge love. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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