danajohnhill.org | Hard Times Come Again No More

Today is the Gainesville Roller Rebels’ first bout in Jacksonville with the Jacksonville Roller Girls.  The excitement is intense!

Filed under: Sports, Travel on April 20th, 2008 | No Comments »

You all know, no doubt, that I am a big fan of Bruce Springsteen. But I am especially a fan of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. That band makes it happen, and a member of the band that made it happen from the very beginning was Danny Federici, the organist, who died yesterday. He had taken a break from the current tour to seek treatment for his cancer, and when he showed up for a performance of “Fourth of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)” in Indianapolis, everyone was hopeful that he’d soon rejoin the band. Alas, that wasn’t to be.

So, next time you hear any great Springsteen song, like “Kitty’s Back” or “Streets of Fire”, listen for the accordion or the Hammond organ. My favorite moment comes in “Jungleland”, at the line “From the churches to the jails, tonight all is silence in the world…” and the huge organ comes in on the word “churches”. It makes the moment. That’s Danny Federici.

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Addendum:  Ben Lazar has posted a wonderful tribute over at his page, A Deeper Shade of Soul.

Filed under: Popular Music on April 18th, 2008 | No Comments »

Last night I dreamed that I was enjoying a newly issued CD of music by Martin Luther King, Jr. (Volume 4 of an ongoing series, no less!), and it was great.  There was a Benedictus for Baritone and Orchestra and another piece called Elegy for Terrance Hamilton.

First of all, I know of no evidence that Dr. King ever wrote music of any kind.  Certainly he could read music and play a little piano, but this was something else entirely.  Second, the level of specificity in my dream was really astonishing.  I awoke around five o’clock this morning and lay there impressed by the detail.  Terrance Hamilton?  Who is that? And, if–just hypothetically–Dr. King had been a composer, he might well have set an Elegy or the Song of Zachariah.

What amuses me most about all of this is how starkly it contrasts to my waking thoughts.  I am about the least imaginative person alive.  I couldn’t make up an original story to save my life.  And sometimes, even my dreams aren’t even fantastic or unique, like when I recently dreamed that my friend Brenna was a mother.  (She actually is a mom in real life.)  Or how my friend Briana was a teacher.  (She is.)  Or when I awoke to tell Miriam that I dreamed I was a serial killer, but that I only killed other serial killers.  She said, “that’s a TV show.”

Other times, though, my mind comes up with the most vivid and abstract notions, like the recent Kitty Karwash, or the dream where I was a two-year-old whose mother had just died, and my father explained that I’d be better off on my own, so I started my own life at two and had assorted adventures.  There was a whole song and everything, and, shockingly enough, I remember it!

The best and most elaborate dream I had within the last few years involved: me awaking one morning and going about my day as normal.  But along my drive that day a few things were not as usual, like a billboard where there wasn’t one before, a missing building, etc.  The next day I arrived at work to find that there were some different people employed.  Eventually, I awoke one morning to find I lived somewhere different and I had a different wife.  Meanwhile, all this time I had been reading an increasing number of newspaper stories about a man somewhere on the other side of the world who was amassing huge wealth suddenly.  Over the same period I was noticing these changes in my life, this man was becoming increasingly powerful.  Nobody but me seemed to have the awareness that their lives were different, but I made the connection that this man must have found a way to alter time, and was using the ability to control the world around him to his advantage, even if it was to the detriment of others.  It was all very cinematic.

If I ever publish a novel, be assured that the plot will be based on a dream I had.

Filed under: Friends, History, Musings on April 18th, 2008 | No Comments »

This afternoon I reacquainted myself with some songs I loved when I was in middle school and the increasing crapulence of top-40 radio drove me from the dial. I took shelter in classics from an earlier age, among which were several songs by a band called Tommy James and the Shondells. Their big hits were “I Think We’re Alone Now”, “Crystal Blue Persuasion”, and two others of which I am decidedly more fond, namely “Crimson and Clover”, and, most of all, “Mirage”.

The “Crimson and Clover” you typically hear on the radio is trimmed of its awesome guitar interlude, and, I confess to also snipping a bit here to illustrate my favorite parts, especially the huge string bend at about 24 seconds:

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“Mirage” is one I almost forgot about forever, until it recently popped into my head, and I am glad it did; it’s a great song, though I wish it were about three minutes longer. It’s got harp glissandi and cool echo effects and a romantic story a middle school-age Dana really liked:

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And that doesn’t even get you to the excellent second verse or chorus.

Ah, nostalgia!

Filed under: Nostalgia, Popular Music on April 17th, 2008 | 2 Comments »

I’m feeling a bit of relief this afternoon, having just put an oral presentation and a final exam behind me.  I think both went well.

My presentation formed the first part of our major semester project in my History of Consumption class.  I’ll write a substantial paper on the same topic for the second part.  The topic I chose is CD collecting, a subject close to my heart, and wallet.  I tried to explain to the class briefly today how one might become a collector of recordings, and how the style and course of collecting might evolve over time, from collecting for repertoire to collecting for performer, and the intricacies of each.  I used some audio-visual aids, including the clips I made of the Barcarolle from Tchaikovsky’s Seasons I posted some time ago.  People seemed interested in my presentation, and I got more questions than I had time to answer.  Afterwards, one girl even passed me a note that read: “I have 12 recordings of the Fanfare for the Common Man (it makes me cry).”  It was sweet of her to share that with me, so I told her she might want to hear Copland’s Symphony No. 3, the last movement of which is built around the Fanfare.  Also, the Lincoln Portrait might be right up her alley.

The final exam in my History of Architecture class had me a little nervous, but I did a lot of studying for it, so I felt reasonably prepared going into it.  The studying paid off, too, since some of the buildings and architects I had just been reviewing over the last couple days were on the test, and had I not used Flickr as a resource to look at pictures of important buildings, I might not have been able to identify some correct answers.

This weekend I need to read a novel, drive to Orlando and back, Jacksonville and back, watch a rock show, review some source material to use in my paper, etc.  Good times!

Filed under: Music, School on April 17th, 2008 | No Comments »