W.C. Handy Birthday

Preservation Hall, New Orleans, LA (April 2011)
William Christopher Handy
Father of the Blues
(16 November 1873 - 28 March 1958)

The MP3 below expired on 11-18-2011.
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Starlite Orchestra (2006)
- St. Louis Blues (Handy)

Fanny Mendelssohn's Birthday Anniversary

Fanny Cäcilie Mendelssohn Hensel
Classical composer and sister of Felix Mendelssohn
(14 November 1805 - 14 May 1847)
The MP3 below expired on 11-15-2011.
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Jennifer Eley, piano (1997)
- Das Jahr "Mai" (F. Mendelssohn Hensel)

Note: Today is also Aaron Copland's Birthday (14 November 1900).

An Old Phone Ringtone Is a Bad Idea

I was playing with the iPhone 4S ring-tones this evening. The thought of my hi-tech phone should ring like those in the old movies sounded inviting. It appealed to me that Harry Lime or Rick Blaine talked on the old rotary phones. Phones which had the "drrring, drrding" is a summons of the caller's despair and distress. So I selected the Old Phone sound as my new ring-tone. Surely, a femme fatale or a damsel in distress should be calling me anytime soon. With the Fedora in hand, so to speak, I was ready.

In any case, I left the phone on the desk and went about doing something else at the far end of the house. When callers tried to contact me earlier in the evening, I blissfully ignored them. I thought, the "drrring drrring" sound was emanating from a recorded film noir playing on the DVR. How ironic.

Alas, Walter Mitty I was not or could never be. Some real corrective action was needed. So I decided to make my own ring-tone.

The iPhone 4S ring-tone is now set to the custom-made "Theme from A Summer Place" as rendered by maestro Norrie Paramor and Patrica Clark (vocal). Henceforth, there can be no mistaken of incoming calls with Clark's distinct vocalise.

I will make some more new ring-tones. Surely, one likely candidate is Anton Karas' "The Third Man Theme".

iPhone Ringtone Download
(For posted iPhone ringtones, download the interested cvs file and submit an email request.)

And This Is My Beloved

Alexander Borodin
classical composer, chemistry professor
founder of St. Petersburg Medical School for Women
winner of posthumous Tony Award in 1954
(12 November 1833 – 27 February 1887)

The MP3 below expired on 11-14-2011.
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Operatic Quartet* (1968)
- And This Is My Beloved (after A. Borodin)

*Kenneth McKellar, tenor
Robert Merrill, baritone
Adele Leigh, soprano
Ian Wallace, bass-baritone
with Mantovani and His Orchestra

Veterans Day 2011

A Veterans Day Remembrance
Click here to view this L'Envoi YouTube.

Veterans Day Prayer and Meditation
Susan Kramer

"You gave for peace with courage
That families may be free
So children could grow strong
And safe they'd ever be.
In giving for the sake of peace
You may have suffered loss
Your body may still show its wounds
From taking up the cause.

May remembrance of your time away
Your sacrifice for peace
Spur us on to strive more strongly
For freedom, that there'll be release.

From causes that sent some away
To fight that we may freely live
With gratefulness we thank you, veterans
For all you gave and give!"

Until the Stars Sighed Out

10 November 2011, 1943 Hours PST; Eastern Sky
Full moon (lower left); Jupiter (upper right)
Canon PowerShot SD780 IS

"And leave the moon-path free for all my thoughts
To wander peacefully
Away and still away
Until the stars sighed out in dawn's great pallor,
Just as the lands of my desire appeared.
What memories ... have I of it!"
    - Cale Young Rice (1921)

Fools Give You Reasons

Bryn Terfel
Welsh Bass-Baritone
(born 9 November 1965)

The MP3 below expired on 11-12-2011.
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Bryn Terfel (2001)
- Some Enchanted Evening
(Rodgers & Hammerstein)

Bali Ha'i

Le choeur non crédités de femmes
"South Pacific" - Bali Ha'i (reprise)
(Rodgers et Hammerstein)

Cliquez ici pour voir le YouTube des L'envoi

Paroles de la chanson - Bali Ha'i (reprise)

Bali Ha'i t’appelle
dans le jour
dans la nuit
dans ton cœur toujours résonne
par ici
me voici

Nos plus chers espoirs
nos plus joyeux rêves
scintillent sur l’eau et sur les monts surgissaient

Si tu veux tu m'trouveras
où le ciel trouve la mer
me voici laisse-moi te prendre
par ici
me voici

Bali Ha'i
Bali Ha'i
Bali Ha'i

The Belgic Confession at 450

November 2011 marks the 450 anniversary of the publication of The Belgic Confession. Of the thirty-seven articles of the confession, Article 26, "Christ Intercession", being the longest and pivotally gospel-centric:

"...For there is no creature, either in heaven or on earth, who loves us more than Jesus Christ;" - Article 26, The Belgic Confession

"What more can be required? since Christ Himself says: I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no one cometh unto the Father, but by me. To what purpose should we, then, seek another advocate, since it has pleased God to give us His own Son as our Advocate? Let us not forsake Him to take another, or rather to seek after another, without ever being able to find Him; for God well knew, when He gave Him to us, that we were sinners." - ibid

So May One Word Dispel a Cloud of Tears

November
John Presland
(1911)

There is a gleam of sunshine on the earth
After so many weary days of rain,
A break of yellowing clouds, which offers plain
The sun's veiled disc (a very shadow-birth,
But still the sun, with sun's November worth);
The sky is of a Turner lived again,
Such colours through the misty greyness gain
They almost seem to touch with spring the earth.

How should we not be glad, when this one day
Out of the saddest of all months, appears
Suddenly beautiful? A single ray
Of sunlight strikes through cloud, and clears
The whole drear countryside of grey;
So may one word dispel a cloud of tears.