England's National Musical-Instrument?

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 12:56 PM

"but a fiddle is always a violin" (IB)...that's ethnocentric - if not fiddlesticks! And, if you check an encyclopedia of music rather than a general dictionary, you'll soon find instruments much earlier than the violin described as a fiddle.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Nerd
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 12:43 PM

IB

You may be right, of course. Certainly, the Shakespeare quotation has a singular fiddle-stick. But it's not clear from that quotation (which is the earliest recorded use in OED) that a fiddle-stick is a bow.

Other names for the sticks used to hit fiddle-strings with are straws, beating sticks, and beating straws. Usually the sticks are very light wood or (nowadays) bamboo. Knitting needles were occasionally used, but that wasn't the norm. Generally, it was an apprentice fiddler who acted as the "straw-beater," but occasionally, as you say, it was the fiddler's wife.

Is this limited to a small region of the US? I don't think so. In the Library of Congress we have examples from Mississippi and Florida, it was known on Georgia plantations in slavery times, (according to the book The Sounds of Slavery by Shane White), and it was common in Idaho at the Weiser Old-Time Fiddling contest. As you can see from the video, it's part of Cajun fiddling too. According to ethnomusicologist and fiddler Erynn Marshall, it was done up in Quebec as well. Those limits define what is really a rather vast area of North America. And the question arises: where id it come from? It could have come from Britain, or France, or been made up in the new world.

Still, of course, no one would nominate fiddlesticks as England's National Musical Instrument.

(Did you like that heroic effort to rein in thread drift?)

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 11:47 AM

According to the OED, 'fiddlestick' singular was in use as early as the fifteenth century (as IB says), and meant 'bow'. The record seems to show people saying "A fiddlestick's end!" (to mean 'something and nothing', 'something completely inconsequential') a bit before people were saying "Fiddlesticks!" (to mean 'nonsense'). It's not conclusive, but it looks to me as if "Fiddlesticks!" is a mutation of the earlier phrase; apart from anything else it's punchier and easier to say.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 11:42 AM

Sorry, woody, bad joke.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 11:34 AM

From: Paul Burke

That's because you were using it as a verb applied to children, Woody.

Please explain?

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 04:46 AM

Fiddlesticks are a pair of sticks you use to hit the strings with

I first came across this about ten years ago via Phil Tyler and we duly experimented with a couple of Japanese chopsticks to quite pleasing effect. As I recall you have to tune the fiddle to an open tuning, playing the sticks on the strings that aren't being fiddled. The term he used was Beating Sticks, and traditionally, seems to be limited to a small region of the USA, with the wife beating her husband's fiddle strings with her knitting needles. I know I certainly hadn't heard of it before, nor indeed since (to be honest I'd quite forgotten about it until now) so I'm not at all convinced that this obscure musical practise is the source of the more widespread term fiddle-sticks, which, according to Here, was recorded from the fifteenth century.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 03:25 AM

That's because you were using it as a verb applied to children, Woody.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 12 Dec 08 - 03:07 AM

As far as I'm aware I've never heard the phrase "Chinese Violin" in the real world. From classical players/teachers I've encountered, the use of the term "fiddle" for their instrument has always gotten a distinctly frosty response. YMMV

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: catspaw49
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 02:21 PM

Axe (or Ax) is probably the last residual of an archaic and now little used Jazz/Blues expression regarding improvisation....."Choppin' Wood." The rest is obvious......

Spaw

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Nerd
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 02:07 PM

Insane Beard,

Here in the US, "fiddle" does not exclusively mean "violin." It more or less means "viol," just as it originally seems to have done. So a double bass is a "bass fiddle." But by default, if the word is said alone, it usually just means "violin."

Fiddlesticks are not bows. (Tellingly, you never hear the word "fiddlestick" in the singular, yet rarely does a player use more than one bow at a time!) Fiddlesticks are a pair of sticks you use to hit the strings with. You can see a video of this, with Dewey Balfa, here

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 01:35 PM

To call any of these instruments a "Chinese Violin" or "Chinese Fiddle" or a "Chinese Lute" or a "Chinese Banjo," is only an approximate description of them from the "western" viewpoint, and does not necessarily mean that they are in any way related to their western counterparts, save by the principles of physics and acoustics by which they function.

To be sure, certain musical instruments are often associated with various countries or localities, such as the bagpipes to Scotland, the harp to Ireland or Wales or both, the banjo to the rural southern United States, the guitar to Spain, et al, but these instruments did not spontaneously generate in any of these places, nor did they set up permanent and exclusive residence there.

In my considered opinion, this whole business about a "National Instrument" is simply not relevant to the real world. It's a bogus concept.

Don Firth

P. S. I think it comes from jazz, and I haven't heard the expression for some time, but one often used to hear an instrument--any instrument--referred to as an "axe." For obvious reasons, I would be very reluctant to try to chop down a tree with my guitar.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 01:00 PM

All classical violinists I know call their instruments fiddles, at least informally, just as they call their bows sticks, but not fiddle-sticks, which is still in common usage but not in music. Formally, it's a different matter, but a fiddle is always a violin. I would think the Er-Hu is more likely to be referred to as a Chinese Violin than a Chinese Fiddle, though the only thing it has in common with a violin is strings and a bow. In the same way a Pipa is referred to by English speakers as a Chinese Lute and a Sanxian as a Chinese Banjo.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 12:47 PM

...but doesn't the term "playing second fiddle" derive from the violin section of orchestras..?

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 11:17 AM

From: GUEST,Working Radish

I don't think anyone would call an erhu a Chinese violin - it would sound patronising and fake.

I think that with some there is a kind of snobbery about calling it a fiddle, particularly when it relates to classical music. This probably accounts for the "Chinese Fiddle" rather than "Chinese Violin" - it seems it might be a way of dismissing the instrument for use in "serious" (i.e. Western Classical) music. Possibly a hangover from less enlightened times?

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Working Radish
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 09:57 AM

I don't think anyone would call an erhu a Chinese violin - it would sound patronising and fake. Calling it a Chinese fiddle has a veneer of ethnomusicology about it - as if our fiddle and the Black Sea fiddle and the Chinese fiddle were all offshoots of the ancestral fiddle diaspora. But there's no justification for this - 'Chinese fiddle' is just as patronising and fake as 'Chinese violin'.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 11 Dec 08 - 06:43 AM

From: Pip Radish

When people say fiddle they're referring to the violin.

Certainly in England the terms' usage appears to be fairly interchangeable. Regarding references to other instruments like the "Chinese Fiddle" - what this name really means is "it's an instrument from China that's a bit like a Fiddle."

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: catspaw49
Date: 10 Dec 08 - 02:30 PM

"Inaccurate Nomenclature" is another name for David Franks.

Also Wavy, how insulting can you possibly be to say that Slow Hand plays "American-Style Pop?"

Spaw

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 10 Dec 08 - 02:23 PM

PLAYING THE FIDDLE?

WAV, this particular chunk of ignorance has been corrected on this thread. Here's your friend and mine, Insane Beard:

When people say fiddle they're referring to the violin. The word has an interesting (complex & by no means fully understood) etymology, but in terms of pragmatics it would seem to derive from a verb rather than a noun - a verb which at last yields the noun violin, but it is interesting that in modern musical usage fiddle exists as both a noun and a verb. That said, the iconographical evidence would suggest the earliest bowed instruments in the West were, in fact, lyres (i.e. crwth, juohikko, talharp etc.) rather than lutes (i.e. violin, viol, vielle, rebec etc.) - but, oddly enough, no bowed-lyre was ever called a fiddle.

So - fiddles are thus called by English speakers simply to denote that the instruments in question are played with a bow. It is only English speakers who would call an Erhu a Chinese Fiddle, likewise the Karandeniz Kemence a Black Sea Fiddle, or a Hardingfele a Hardanger Fiddle. The Hardingfele is a specific development of the violin about as far away from the erhu in terms of organological taxonomy as one could wish to get. In terms of classification they're not even in the same family and yet both get called fiddles by English speakers, which only makes them fiddles in the sense of convenient, but not accurate, nomenclature.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 10 Dec 08 - 01:41 PM

From: Paul Burke

Well my (paternal) grandfather used to play the melodeon while standing on his head, but that wasn't English Folk, that was Music Hall.

I doubt we'd have to limit it to "Folk" instruments - though maybe to eras and styles. For the later part of the 20th century I guess the guitar in all its forms would be the instrument most had played at one time or another and so might qualify for many styles. 21st century? - Well it's early days yet. Late 19th Century & early 20th? The piano would have to be high up there - especially in pub culture. Concertina - all types, Melodeon and PA would also get a shout.

Any answer would obviously be an arbitrary and nonsense one but it's interesting to explore. For my money though, for it's pervasiveness, versatility and longevity it's got to be the fiddle.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 10 Dec 08 - 12:34 PM

"Obviously fiddle - played a lot now but also played in England for hundreds of years and recognisable to most - would be a good candidate" (Woody)...

"PLAYING THE FIDDLE?

There are many different fiddles from many different lands – for example, the Chinese erhu fiddle, the Norwegian hardanger fiddle and, the one most in the West now play, the Italian fiddle/violin" (here).

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 10 Dec 08 - 04:37 AM

Well my (paternal) grandfather used to play the melodeon while standing on his head, but that wasn't English Folk, that was Music Hall. He was (3rd generation) Irish anyway.

If my maternal granny's side is anything to go by, the main instrument was the Parlour Piano, all walnut and ivory, with brass candlesticks. Nobody ever played it, because the parlour was damp, the piano was rusty inside, and it had never been tuned in fifty years. We demolished it one bonfire night, and it was so rotten we couldn't get it to burn until someone doused it in paraffin. They sang a lot though- usually unaccompanied, old traditional English songs like Show Me The way To Go Home, Come Back to Sorrento, The Happy Wanderer, Ave Maria, The Laughing Policeman, The Hole In The Elephant's Bottom (My dad's party piece when several bottles down), Cardigan The Fearless, Eileen Og, Hullabalooballay, Down Came The Blind, Donald Where's Your Troosers, Mother Machree, and so on. I think it was meant to be in harmony, but not really sure.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 10 Dec 08 - 03:23 AM

Well it wouldn't have to be the most played. I'm sure lots less people in Scotland play Bagpipes than Electric Guitar but most Scots know what the pipes are.

Today in 21st Century England there could be many instruments that fit the bill. Obviously fiddle - played a lot now but also played in England for hundreds of years and recognisable to most - would be a good candidate, as would the guitar, G/D Melodeon (recognisable to many), and whistle (though many might think it Irish). What relevance obsolete Elizabethan instruments have to 21st century England I don't know, and for those into tradition - I'm sure my great-great grandparents wouldn't have thought them relevant to the 19th Century either.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Tootler
Date: 09 Dec 08 - 05:21 PM

Ah Woody - On that basis, England's National Musical Instrument has to be - wait for it - The Electric Guitar!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 09 Dec 08 - 02:34 PM

From: Stringsinger

It seems that the Cittern could be a national English instrument. Also,
for obvious reasons, the Elizabethan lute.

With all due respect - how the bloody hell can it be a national instrument when there's only one man and his dog playing it? If you were asking "What was Elizabethan England's National Instrument" then maybe.

If it's a national instrument presumably the nation should know what the hell you're talking about?

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 09 Dec 08 - 12:25 PM

"It seems that the Cittern could be a national English instrument. Also, for obvious reasons, the Elizabethan lute. Campion, Dowland and other great songwriters wrote for it." (Stringsinger)...Not sure which bird/s (I'm not a peasant plucker...) but, apparently, the 5 times 2 metal strings of the English cittern were plucked with a feather-plectrum.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 08 Dec 08 - 04:46 PM

It wasn't Mr (now Lord) Mandelson who mistook mushy peas for guacamole in a Hartlepool fish & chip shop but one of his aides (source: another aide).
Mushy peas - now that's a real English vegetable.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 08 Dec 08 - 04:26 PM

Yeah, it did occur to me that, when it comes to "good English culture," guacamole is kind of a far cry from pottage and mead. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 08 Dec 08 - 03:42 PM

Guacamole.

North-east England.

Which local food and New Labour politician come to mind?

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Dec 08 - 12:51 PM

Don and Woody - I was actually in Tijuana, Mexico, for 2 weeks: making a few day trips, inluding one back over the border to San Diego, and one along Baja California by bus (seeing jumping beans for the first time); I also played the golf course and, as I say, eat very well and inexpensively on the delicious cuisine.
Ruth - I'll keep that in mind, too...I find vine tomatoes far tastier but, again, not available at my local "super"market.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 05:44 PM

David: chuck a chopped tomato and a dollop of creme fraiche into your avocado when you're mashing it. Then add a squeeze of lime. You'll thank me.

Avocado is all right spread on toast (British sailors apparently used it as a butter substitute, which is one of the reasons they didn't get scurvy), but it's so easy to make it much tastier...

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 01:25 PM

By the way, following on my previous post (and paying homage to this thread being above the line, hence, related to music), there are some very good luthiers in Mexico and I've played some really good guitars that came from south of the border. But there is an incredible amount of crap to be had from there also, such as the ones hanging in the Tijuana tourist shops. I peered through the sound hole of one of them and notice that there was sap still oozing out of the wood. Sound? Very muddy.

But it was very pretty, if you like lots of mother of pearl. It would have made a nice wall-hanging.

Caveat emptor!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 01:14 PM

Tijuana!?? David, I hope you saw more of Mexico than Tijuana (which is about three baby steps south of the California-Mexico border).

I've been there, and it's hardly what I would call "Mexico" if you're looking for real Mexican culture. It's a town full of shops for American tourists looking for bargains, like $25.00 guitars with elaborate (gaudy) mother of pearl inlay work, but made with green, unseasoned wood—or beautifully embroidered dresses that some poor Mexican woman spent days or weeks working on, for which she received maybe a couple of pesos, but the shop sells for $35 or $40 to tourists.

You can have your picture taken with a burro. For a few dollars extra, the photographer will loan you a sombrero and a serape to wear as you stand by the burro.

The sidewalk cafes (where you can get exotic cuisine such as nachos made with Frito-Lay tortilla chips and melted Velveeta cheese) are infested with children with soulful eyes (but downright chubby from being grossly overfed on junk food given them by sympathetic but easy-mark tourists) hovering around your table and trying to guilt-trip you into hand-outs.

When I was there, there were also a number of Guatemalan children, refugees from hostilities, begging on the streets because they were hungry—and homeless.

You can't walk for more than a block without at least three provocatively dressed women accosting you and asking if you are "looking for something special?" The "looking for something special" phrase is so that if the police try to pick them up for soliciting, they can claim they were just trying to assist a bewildered tourist.

No, Tijuana is in Mexico (by a few feet), but it's hardly what anyone would call typical of Mexico. I certainly hope you saw more of Mexico than that.

####

You really need more than just avocado for guacamole. It might depend on what your red sauce consists of, but spaghetti sauce or pizza sauce ain't gonna cut it. Salsa, either medium or hot, on the other hand, would be much better. Guacamole should have a bit of "snap" to it, otherwise it's just avocado (which is fine by itself, but it isn't yet guacamole).

Real guacamole usually contains finely chopped onion, tomato, and cilantro, and a bit of salt. Peppers, often jalapeños, are an essential part of the mix, and don't forget the lemon or lime juice, both for flavoring and to neutralize the enzyme that causes the avocado to turn brown when exposed to air for any period of time. And be sure to store in the refrigerator if you're going to keep it for any length of time. But even in the fridge, it doesn't last forever.

Don Firth

P. S. Thanks for the movie recommendations, folks! My wife and I have a NetFlix subscription (a friend gave it to us as a Christmas present one year and he re-ups it every year—Thanks, Will! Uh . . . a different Will). We've seen a lot of good movies, some we had never heard of, since we got the subscription.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 01:11 PM

It seems that the Cittern could be a national English instrument. Also,
for obvious reasons, the Elizabethan lute. Campion, Dowland and other
great songwriters wrote for it.

You could also argue that the Kammeyer five-string banjo with the
fifth string running through the slotted head rather than a fifth peg
would be an English development as well. I used to own one of those
instruments which were used in classical banjo playing but with steel strings.

Frank

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Smokey
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 01:04 PM

Viv's gigs were always rather unpredictable, I did the mixing at several in the mid 70's - you never knew who was going to turn up and play, he seemed to know everyone. Drunk or sober, he was a wonderful bloke. If a little unpredictable.. I was playing in rock bands back then though, so behavioral excesses were the norm - though Viv did seem to have made an art form of it.

"I don't know what I want, but I want it now!"

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Will Fly
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 12:41 PM

Smokey:
Don and Will, I can't resist taking the liberty of pointing you toward the work of my all-time hero Vivian Stanshall, "Sir Henry at Rawlinson End". There's both a film and an album, slightly different in every sense. I'm almost sure it would appeal to you both. English eccentricity at its finest.

I know it well. My last personal encounter with VS was at a village hall dance near Esher, back in the early 70s. Our band was the booked act, and Viv and a few friends had turned up, unasked, to play as an unofficial support. Viv sober was a lovely man. Viv not sober...

Unfortunately, although the performance (jazz-ish) was terrible, he was surrounded by some very sycophantic and vociferous "friends", who egged his lot to play on, and on, and on... We eventually did 15 minutes, collected our money and drove back to London and home. An evening to remember; when I next met him - back to normal and his usual self - he couldn't remember any of it. The Rawlinsons, of course, were one of the guest acts on "The Intro and The Outro"!

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 12:40 PM

Vivian Stanshall, "Sir Henry at Rawlinson End".

Another Icon of Englishness! But whilst the film and album are good - eternal favourites of mine anyway - let's not forget the sessions he did for John Peel which were the essence of Rawlinson End, and in which Stanshall excels in his sublime evocations. Some of these were re-edited for Radio 4's Book at Bedtime a few years back (over a decade actually) - & the sequence makes about 75 minutes of perfect listening. There's a stray episode on YouTube Here - but ignore the horrible graphics. This was a radio broadcast so treat it as such...

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 12:30 PM

Michael Hordern plays a lecherous butler.

Cheers Don & Will - I didn't get to watch Colonel Blimp after all; Ross came round and lifted my spirits by taking me out for a walk to savour the day & the sunshine & the beguiling halcyon calm - see Here for view from Fleetwood beach to the snow capped mountains of the Lake District - not an amazing picture, but I was a bit shivery! The joys of living in Fleetwood really...

Still to emerge from the boxes still unpacked: Michael Hordern reads the Ghost Stories of M R James - True Icons of Englishness and essential Christmas listening besides. I hope BBC4 are screening the TV adaptations again this year - of which, of course, the best has to be Jonathan Miller's 1968 adaptation of Oh Whistle and I'll Come to You, My Lad starring Michael Hordern in one of his key roles.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Smokey
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 12:28 PM

Don and Will, I can't resist taking the liberty of pointing you toward the work of my all-time hero Vivian Stanshall, "Sir Henry at Rawlinson End". There's both a film and an album, slightly different in every sense. I'm almost sure it would appeal to you both. English eccentricity at its finest.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 07 Dec 08 - 12:12 PM

Poem 36 of 230: WALKABOUT MEXICO

So what this is saying is that you popped over the border to a plastic Tex-Mex caricature for a day and you consider that qualifies as visiting and experiencing the culture of Mexico?????

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 05:17 PM

Fuck, that even makes James Taylor's "Mexico" sound good.

What English-language takes on Mexico could we suggest to WAV to bring home the immennse yawning chasm that separates that kind of braindead doggerel from anything worth reading or listening to, on the counterfactual assumption that he'd ever bother finding them or take them on board? Woody Guthrie's "Deportees" and Malcolm Lowry's "Under the Volcano" come to mind.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 04:20 PM

Ruth and Don: my local supermarket is okay but not that "super" in terms of fresh vegetables - but when I get the chance I'll try some of the above; and the avocado spread I occasionally use is just that - a softish one cut in half and then spread on toast, with either red sauce, or peanut butter and raspberry jam (but I didn't know about Don's lemon juice trick for leftovers). Also, a highlight of my visit to Mexico, below, was the delicious cuisine.

Poem 36 of 230: WALKABOUT MEXICO

In late December,
    1996,
I can remember
    Being in a fix -
For time and pesos -
    And, thus, unable
To see Mexico's
    Sights commendable.

So, in Tijuana,
    I enjoyed the show
At a miniature
    Rep. of Mexico.

From walkaboutsverse.741.com

Back on-thread: an elastic band and paper clip, bent to a right-angle, at the foot of a recorder/English flute, form a simple system for attaching the music - until memorized.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 04:18 PM

The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. Good movie. I've always enjoyed Roger Livesey. Another one he's in is Futtock's End, a goofy comedy with Ronnie Barker, Michael Hordern, and others. It's the sort of thing you might expect to find Ronnie Barker in. There is no actual dialogue, but lots of grunts, incoherent mumblings, and sound effects.

Roger Livesey plays an artist attempting to paint landscapes and what he's attempting to paint keeps moving on him. He looks, then concentrates on the canvas for a few moments, and when he looks again, the landscape has changed. You see what's going on, but he is totally bewildered.

Also, I understand that Livesey, in his mid-sixties at the time, insisted on doing his own stunts, like getting ejected from the grossly overloaded back seat of a car when the door is opened and landing on his back.

Michael Hordern plays a lecherous butler.

IB, hunker down, rest up, have a few good laughs (very therapeutic), and get well soon.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Will Fly
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 05:33 AM

IB - hope you aren't feeling too wretched today. Powell & Pressburger are always worth watching, and they probably made some of the most subtle films of the period.

Best wishes,

Will

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 05:29 AM

Lord Buckley, eh? Well that's a new one on me, so thanks for that, Don - a revelation! And always good to see Groucho. In fact, being ill today (and home alone - this being one of my wife's occasional working weekends) perhaps I'll line up a few old Marx Brothers films, beginning, of course, with The Cocoanuts - or should I leave that for last? It being my all-time favourite movie...

But what's this I see? BBC2 - 2.10pm - The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp - now there's one I haven't seen for a while. Of course what I really want to see right now is You'll Find Out, the 1940 Kay Kyser horror-spoof featuring Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff and Peter Lorre - and some of creepiest vocal effects in the history of cinema besides...

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Woody
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 05:08 AM

From: Ruth Archer

Honestly, David - if you don't fancy working too hard...

Ah well! I think we all know the answer to that one Ruth.

You'd think that as he's doing bugger all else of any worth, he might at least use his abundant free time to learn to cook. And of course, women shouldn't as it may make their arms all bulgy.


From: WalkaboutsVerse

...I being mostly vegan...

Hee hee hee. Possibly the most stupid thing you've said?


...smooth peanut butter; also, for a treat, I'll spread avocado/gaucamole on toast.

How quaintly English. Just like it was in the 1950s

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Smokey
Date: 06 Dec 08 - 12:25 AM

Charming tales Don, and somehow I'm not surprised. It's good to learn LRB was the gentleman he seemed to be. A lesson to us all, I think. Thanks again.

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Dec 08 - 11:12 PM

In the early 1960s I met a fellow by the name of Jean Galland who made his way through Seattle and sang for a time at one of the local clubs before he moved on. Jean was French and he loved American folk music, which he sang with a French accent. He couldn't help it. Interestingly enough, he got turned on to American folk music by Rolf Cahn, a German immigrant who sang American (and Scottish) folk songs with a slight German accent.

Anyway, Jean had met Lord Buckley in San Francisco and he told me a couple of stories about him. He said that when he could afford to, his Lordship rode around San Francisco in a chauffeured limousine. One day he, in the limo, passed an elderly woman who was standing on the curb wanting to cross the street, but the traffic was too heavy and drivers were simply ignoring the fact that there was a pedestrian crosswalk there. His Lordship told the limo driver to circle the block. But he wanted to make a quick stop at a flower shop one street over.

As the woman stood there, despairing of ever getting across the street, this limousine pulled up and parked and a tall, well-dressed and mustachioed gentleman got out carrying a big bouquet of flowers. He offered the lady his arm and with an imperious glance as he held up a hand, he stopped traffic and conducted the lady across the street. When he saw her safely on the other side, he bowed, kissed her hand, presented her with the bouquet, bowed again, and returned across the street to his limo.

His Lordship would sometimes hold salon in his San Francisco apartment, where he would welcome a few friends for drinks and some good conversation. One of Jean's friends often attended these salons and he invited Jean to go with him. When they arrived at his Lordship's, his Lordship asked Jean what his shoe size was. He came back a few moments later with a pair of soft slippers in Jean's size and invited him to change from his shoes to the slippers. This was not to save his Lordship's carpets, it was because, as his Lordship explained to Jean, "I want everyone here to feel relaxed and comfortable." Jean notice that everyone there was wearing slippers. He also noted that his Lordship had a whole closet shelf of slippers with name-tags on them. The next time Jean came, his Lordship presented him with a new pair of slippers with his name on the tag.

That true nobility that Lord Buckley talked about; he, indeed, was well endowed with it himself.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: GUEST,Smokey
Date: 05 Dec 08 - 10:31 PM

What a character.. What a philosophy.. yes, you were fortunate even to have seen him - they don't seem to make 'em like that any more. Many thanks for that, you've made an old hippy very happy :)

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Dec 08 - 08:34 PM

Smokey, I can't honestly say that I actually met his Lordship, but Bob and I enjoyed his (whatever he does) with much laughter and amazement from a table about five feet from the small stage, and as was his Lordship's wont, our eyes met on several occasions, but beyond that, we didn't actually exchange greetings.

I had never heard of Lord Buckley when Bob and I were walking down the Bridgeway one evening and we ran into Koz, one of the weekend denizens of Sausalito (Koz was a fascinating character on his own, but that's another story). He said that he had heard this guy at the No Name the previous evening and he was going to be back this evening. He urged us to come. He said, "I can't figure out what he is. Is he a stand-up comic? Is he a preacher? Is he nuts!?"

Well—all of those things, I guess.

We saw Lord Buckley on two occasions at the "No Name Tavern," and he did his thing for a couple of hours each time. Among other things, he treated us with his classics:   The Nazz, The Raven (The Bug Bird), Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, several speeches from Shakespeare (Willie the Shake) including Marc Antony's funeral oration (he did part of it for Groucho), and one that really digs deep, The Black Cross.

At one point, he explained his philosophy, a bit more thoroughly than he had a chance to explain it to Groucho. He said that he addresses people as "Milord" and "Milady" because no matter how obscure, or how small, mean, and petty a person might be, inside, sometimes hidden down deep inside, there is a spark of true nobility. And it is this spark which he wishes to acknowledge and address.

And then he got serious for a moment. He opened his arms expansively and said, "Would it embarrass you awfully if I told you that I love you all?'

The audience shuffled their feet and shifted uncomfortably in their seats.

"Yes," said his Lordship with a rueful smile and a shake of the head, "I see that it does. But I do love you all, you know."

Then he cleared his throat and went into his next routine.

Not a bad philosophy. Not bad at all.

This was in September or October of 1959. It was some months later that Lord Buckley went to The Gate of Horn in Chicago, then in October of 1960 he went to perform at the Jazz Gallery in New York, with a possible appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show. But for some unexplained reason, the New York police took away his cabaret card (a legal requirement to perform in New York clubs at the time). More that three dozen major entertainment figures, including author George Plimpton, attempted to intervene and get his card restored, but without success. A few days later, he was taken to a hospital where he died. Cause of death, unspecified.

There are many bizarre stories about how his Lordship died: one that he died of a stroke, another that he died from exhaustion after drinking vodka spiked with mescaline and making love to an underage mulatto girl—and another that he had been beaten to death by the police. But as far as I know, to this day, there has never been an adequate explanation for his Lordship's sudden demise.

I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to hear him when I did.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: England's National Musical-Instrument?
From: s&r
Date: 05 Dec 08 - 07:06 PM

'Mostly Vegan' is a sort of contradiction in terms like 'a little bit pregnant'.

Stu