Tone Matters?

Making an old piano sound new
The Piano Doctor

I am going to assume this guy believes what he is saying. I'm sorry, I can't hear any difference between old and new. Okay, I might be able to hear a slight difference, but not enough for me to say one is better than the other. It might be because I am old, or because my loudspeaker is weak, but I suspect my brain is not as sensitive to sound as some other people.

I was talking to a guy I know about tunes and he tells me he doesn't really care for instrumental music, he prefers singing. That shocked me. I never understood the popularity of opera. I find opera tedious in the extreme. Singing by itself is not my favorite. I like a tune with music, singing and lyrics that are clear. Lyrics don't have to be totally clear, nonsense is sometimes okay, and there are any number of tunes out there I have zero affection for. Rock and roll and jazz are more my cup of tea.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Delphon "DJ" Curtis Jr. in Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Photo by Shawnte Sims.

We went to see Hedwig and the Angry Inch at Portland Center Stage yesterday afternoon. I didn't much care for it. It's the story of a person from East Germany, child of an east Asian woman and an American GI, victim of a botched sex change operation. What is an American GI doing in East Berlin? I suppose it could have been before the wall went up, but the wall figures prominently in her mind.

She did point out that there have been several, crypto-sexuals I think she called them, that became big musical stars, like David Bowie, Lou Reed and another whose name escapes me. Anyway he/she/it was on her way to becoming a star but then something went wrong and now she's doing small shows in small out of the way places.

There is a bunch of singing. She has a powerful voice, but the music was rock. I used to really like rock music when I was younger, and I still enjoy it sometimes. It's better when I've had a couple-three drinks and something to smoke, but that doesn't happen much these days. Now I'm listening to Quantic, Fat Freddies Drop and Daniel Norgren.

I was astounded by The Rocky Horror Picture Show when I saw it the first time a zillion years ago. I thought it was great. It also featured a transexual, but he/she/it was just another character in the story. I was also able to understand the words in Rocky, I missed about half of the words in Hedwig, probably due to my aging brain not being able to process mumbled dialog as well as I used to. No, I don't need a hearing aid. I've had my hearing checked and technically it is fine. Seems to be a congenital brain thing.  Might explain why my musical talent is non-existent.

Mass Market Politics

Indian soldiers who served during World War I in France. ca. 1915. (Library of Congress)

I have a hard time communicating with my family. They like to talk, they talk a lot, when they are together they talk constantly. But it's not deliberate, considered, speech. They banter. What they say is not nearly as important as how it is said. Their comments fly back and forth. I suppose they are meaningful to them but to me it's just so much noise. I gave up trying to understand their conversations some time ago. I got tired of asking them to repeat themselves and getting responses that implied I was old and hard of hearing. I had my hearing checked, it's just fine. Doc told me it's a common affliction among older men. There's nothing wrong with the ears, it's the sound processing part of the brain that's not keeping up. I suspect it's because it doesn't get as much use as it used to because I quit listening to people talk because I never heard anything worth hearing. It's all just noise. I've got better things to think about. Yes, I'm a grumpy old fart.
    I've been making an effort the last few years to pay attention to politics, but I have decided it's a lost cause. There's too much money promoting unknown agendas. Media coverage follows whoever is making the biggest stink, regardless of how important it is. Actual, real important things are buried, never to be heard about, much less discussed. It's like my family's bantering, played on a grand scale. It's okay, it gives people something to do, and that more than anything is what we all need.
    The only organizations I trust are the NRA and the ACLU (the National Rifle Association and the American Civil Liberties Union). The NRA seems to be doing fine without me, and the ACLU is such a weak sister I'm not sure anything I could do would make any difference. I trust these two because one, they have a very narrow focus, and two, they have been around for a long time and they have stuck to their guns, so to speak.

Regarding the photo: I did a search on the title and this picture was the coolest one that popped up.

Sounds versus Voices

I have trouble understanding what some people say, particularly young people and women. OK, most people. A while back I had my hearing checked and my hearing, as far as the tests go, is fine. Doctor told me this is a common problem with older men and the medical establishment has no explanation for it. Today I think I figured out the problem. I don't spend as much time talking with people as I used to. I spend more time just listening to sounds in my environment, and they usually don't include people's voices. Basically, I just don't get enough practice listening to people talk.

Quote of the Day

I spent my whole life trying not to be careless. Women and children can be careless. But not men. Don Corleone, instructing his son Michael in the movie The Godfather.

Ross and I watched this last night. What a fine movie. Last Sunday there was an ad in the paper for hearing aids (when is there ever a Sunday paper without ads for hearing aids?). They quoted some old guy saying "I can hear, but I just can't understand". I have the same problem. My wife and kids complained about it so much I went to see the doctor and he ran a hearing test on me and my hearing is fine. A little high frequency loss in the right ear, but nothing to worry about. Probably from shooting without ear plugs. I have this one Eastern European automatic that shoots a pretty hot cartridge. It makes a distinctive crack when fired and I really liked that sound. So that may be the source of the damage. But like the doc said, it's not significant. So I ask him what's going on and he tells me it's a common problem with men. It's not a problem with their ears, it's something in the part of the brain that processes sound. So now we come back to The Godfather. Women and children are no more careless than men, it's just that they are careful about different things. What people say, how they say it, and the tone they use when saying these things, this is what's important to women and children. This is one of those things that makes society function. Some men tend to have different interests and different concerns. To them, the nuances of conversation are just meaningless fluff. If you have something to say, say it, don't give me all this jibber-jabber. Individual sounds become more important. Doors opening and closing. Wind and rain. Cars, gunshots, screams. Footsteps.

Movies: Brick, Dreamgirls, The Proposition, Hard Luck

Let's see if I can remember all the movies I watched this weekend. Last night my wife and I watched "Brick", a great little movie. Just like watching an old Humphrey Bogart detective movie, the dialog, the scenes, the characters, the plot was just like an old film noir. Except. It was set in a modern high school in California. The only problem we had with it was that much of the dialog was unintelligible, even when we went back and replayed it a couple of times. Subtitles would have helped. In the movies defense, I have the same trouble with my kids. I often have to ask them to repeat themselves, which they often decline to do, or do so grudgingly. I had my hearing checked recently at a doctor's office and they claim my hearing is fine, though I have lost some of the high frequencies due to my age. I was talking to a doctor about this problem a couple of years ago, and he told me it is a known phenomena that as men get older they have a harder time understanding conversations, especially when several people are talking at once. I have yet to find an explanation. My wife and I took our boys with us to see "Dreamgirls" Saturday evening. The story was, I hope, educational for my boys. Beyonce had one line that I thought was really good where she states that Effie (Jennifer Hudson) had a much better voice than she did, and during most of the movie, this was true. At the end of the film though, Beyonce has one song where she really lets it out, leaving no doubt about her vocal abilities. It was nice to see Jennifer Hudson getting to show her off her talents. Friday night we watched "Hard Luck" with Wesley Snipes and Cybill Shepherd, and "The Proposition", a Western from Australia. Didn't get to sleep till three in the morning. Both movies portrayed some severe physical cruelty. That really bothered me. In the end, the good guys triumph, and the bad guys get their comeuppance, but I really did not need to see either one of these. "The Proposition" was a much better movie.