Your Daily Dose of Christmas!

I heard this piece on one of the SiriusXM Holiday music channels yesterday, and…that’s literally all I know about it. Enjoy! It’s quite short. (Sometimes on this feature I go into depth talking about a longer-form work, other times I say, “Here’s music. Go forth!” This is the latter.)

 

Posted in On Music | Tagged | Comments Off on Your Daily Dose of Christmas!

Your Daily Dose of Christmas!

In college, every year we did a big Christmas Pageant thing, a big concert of sacred music performed by the combined forces of the concert band, the choir, and the jazz vocal group. This was all tied together by a voice narration by a professor from the Religion Department, mostly Biblical quotes from the passages in the Gospels pertaining to the birth of Jesus. While most of the selections changed every year, one stalwart work showed up on each performance, for obvious reason: it’s something of an ostentatious showpiece. It’s called “Sing a New Song”, by composer Frank Bencriscutto.

Bencriscutto was a major figure in band and wind ensemble music in the 20th century. He taught at the University of Minnesota for many years, and many of his compositions have become standard works in the band repertoire. This work always caught first-year students by surprise, the first time we turned our attention to it in rehearsals; the work’s beginning made many a student jump in their seat when they heard it. Including one particular trumpet player in 1989.

Here is “Sing a New Song” by Frank Bencriscutto.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Your Daily Dose of Christmas!

Your Daily Dose of Christmas

Yesterday, Taylor Swift.

Today, Beyonce.

I see no reason to have to choose between these two. I live in a time when they’re both doing amazing things.

 

Posted in On Music | Tagged | Comments Off on Your Daily Dose of Christmas

Your Daily Dose of Christmas

There’s no questioning that 2023 belonged to Taylor Swift. And I may have missed the Eras tour, but next time? I want to be there! I don’t know her music enough to call myself a “Swiftie”, but I like her a great deal.

Anyway, here’s Ms. Swift.

 

Posted in On Music | Tagged | 1 Comment

Adventures in Hot Booze

The Tom and Jerry is a beloved holiday cocktail in these parts. And I knew nothing about it until just a few years ago.

The drink is basically a kind of boozy eggnog, with extra spices, served hot. It’s really not the kind of drink you can have more than one of–at least I can’t, because a well-made T&J is really rich and decadent and sweet. Drinking one feels like dessert before the entree arrives. At least, that’s what it felt like to me, because I ordered one first when we went to dinner the other night. We were at a place called, believe it or not, The Place. It’s in the city of Buffalo, and the restaurant was a delight.

The Tom and Jerry is an old-school drink. Restaurants that serve it can’t just dish it up in any old mug! You apparently need a white mug with “Tom and Jerry” on it, and some places have their own special sets that they’ve used for years and years. They’ll actually mix up a large bowl of it and dish it up into matching mugs. Here’s a representative example of a Tom and Jerry punchbowl and mug set:

That’s from an eBay auction. No, I did not bid! I wouldn’t need something that large, and in any case, I’d be the only one drinking the T&Js if I were to make them at home. The Wife and The Kid are, ahem, unenthusiastic about the prospect of drinks where eggs are a major ingredient.

And besides, T&Js aren’t exactly a quick drink to make, either. You have to make the batter first, and then some of the batter is put in the mug with booze and hot water. Here’s a typical recipe. Note the ingredients and the steps involved: separate a dozen eggs! Whip the egg whites! Fold with spices and…yeah, I’m not doing all of that. Not for just myself, anyway. I’ve read that you can buy pre-mixed T&J batter in some places, but I’ve never looked for it.

No, for my own home hot rum drink enjoyment, I’ll stick with Hot Buttered Rum (which I will be mixing up probably this weekend). I sure do like a Tom and Jerry, though. And I miss the place I first tried one: a restaurant and bar in an old farmhouse in Concord, NY, called Mary’s Fireside Inn. This wonderful place did not survive the pandemic, sadly (and a debilitating fire probably was even more damaging in that regard). We loved going down there, especially at Christmastime…and not just for the Tom and Jerry’s.

 

 

 

Posted in On Food and Cooking | Tagged | 1 Comment

Your Daily Dose of Christmas

In memory of my friend Robert John Guttke, I present one of his favorite works by a composer he dearly loved.

Gerald Finzi was a British composer who lived from 1901 to 1956. His best-known output is primarily choral, and he was not prolific. Finzi left fewer than fifty compositions behind, but his voice is wonderfully British in the vein of Ralph Vaughan Williams: clear-minded and often ethereal, Finzi’s work is often inspired by poetry that he loved. Finzi had a personal library of over 3000 books, many of which were English poetry.

I first heard this piece via a compilation CD that Robert Guttke made and sent my way, and it has since become a staple of my holiday listening. Every year when I hear it (and another piece still to come) I think of Robert and his constant search for music that made him feel.

Posted in On Music | Tagged | Comments Off on Your Daily Dose of Christmas

Your Daily Dose of Christmas!

Never let it be said I don’t take requests! In comments to yesterday’s post, a reader asks about the possibility of the hammered dulcimer making an appearance in this series. I confess to not being familiar at all with this instrument; I know it exists, but that’s about it. I didn’t even know how it was played, beyond it involving, well, hammers. Turns out the hammers are a special kind of mallet that one deploys over the dulcimer’s strings to produce tones.

And it’s a very pleasing sound, I must admit. So, here are selections!

 

Posted in On Music | Tagged | 1 Comment

A regret

My mother missed outliving Henry Kissinger by just eighteen days. She would have liked to see him go.

 

Posted in Commentary | Tagged | Comments Off on A regret

Your Daily Dose of Christmas!

OK, today I provide a public service, if you so desire.

You may be familiar with a game called Whamageddon, in which you try to get as deep into December as you can without hearing “Last Christmas” by Wham!. Why this game, why this song? No idea, really…only the song is pretty ubiquitous as Christmas songs go, and many people find it outright annoying. (For me, the song is an “in one ear and out the other” song, I don’t have an opinion of it, one way or the other.)

As soon as you recognize that you’re hearing the original version of the song (it also has been covered a lot), you’re out.

Now, I personally have amended these rules with one caveat: if you hear it in a setting where you have no control over the music, it doesn’t count. Now, that doesn’t mean basically everywhere! You don’t control what you hear when you’re walking through Target, but you did choose to go to Target at that time! So that counts. But if you hear it at work, that doesn’t count. I’d also extend that to hearing it at doctor’s appointments, the hospital, or any other place where you really have to be for one reason or another. But if you could choose to be in that place, and you could have been there another time, and that’s when you hear “Last Christmas”, well. Bad luck, champ!

So anyway, if you’d just like to self-terminate your participation in this weird game and get it over with so you’re not finding your December increasingly dominated by the weird anxiety of possibly hearing “Last Christmas” through little fault of your own, well, I’m here to help. Just play the video below, breathe a sigh of relief, and go about your December like a non-weird person.

 

Posted in On Music | Tagged | 3 Comments

Your Daily Dose of Christmas

It’s December, so here we go. This year things feel markedly different. I suppose there’s only one way to avoid having to celebrate a first Christmas without your mother, and…well, I’m not signing up for that.

But still.

I’ve always featured this particular carol, all by itself, in a single post at some point. This year, it’s leading off, because it was her favorite Christmas carol. I hope you’re somewhere that you can hear these, Mom.

I hope.

 

Posted in On Music | Tagged | 1 Comment