Category: The Evening Pause
A nightly pause from the news to give the reader/viewer a bit of classic entertainment.
Longplayer
An evening pause: This piece of music has been playing since 1999 and will continue until 2999. Very meditative.
Kate Wolf – Eyes of a Painter
An evening pause: Kate Wolf sadly passed away prematurely in 1986. Here is a live performance from 1985.
Antonio Breschi – Language of the Land
An evening pause: Antonio Breschi again, this time with a piece of his own, from his album At the Edge of the Night. Last week I posted a breathtaking piano performance by Breschi, but unfortunately, I can’t find a video of him playing this particular piece, which I first heard back in the mid-1980s. Nonetheless, the music so beautiful it is really doesn’t need fancy visuals.
Carole King – Tapestry
The world’s smallest V-12 engine
An evening pause: Watch the assembly of the world’s smallest v-12 engine. Though the titles are in Spanish, it is quite clear what is going on. And the thing works!
Patti LuPone – Sleepy Man
Joe Hisaishi – theme from My Neighbor Totoro
An evening pause: Composer Joe Hisaishi conducts and plays piano in this live performance of his music from the animated film, My Neighbor Totoro.
I just watched the film again with family, and my opinion of it only grows with each viewing.
The Shirelles – Will You Love Me Tomorrow
An evening pause: Performed live by the Shirelles, 1964, with Shirley Alston Reeves as lead and Beverly Lee, Addie “Micki” Harris, and Doris Kenner as backup.
Antonio Breschi – from Bach to Ireland on the piano
Cousin Jake, Uncle Josh, Earl Scruggs – Nobody’s business
Olivia Newton John – Don’t Cry For Me Argentina
Bee Gees – I Started a Joke
An evening pause: In honor of the passing of Robin Gibbs on May 20. This performance was recorded live at Festival Hall in Melbourne, Australia in 1971.
Bridge Day rappel
An evening pause: Bridge Day 2011: An 800+ foot rappel from the New River Gorge Bridge in West Virginia. The event is held each fall, when they close the bridge to vehicles so pedestrians, base jumpers, and rappellers can enjoy it. I’ve done this rappel four times, twice as part of the safety team.
On the clip below, the rappel itself begins at 3:40. As this was this guy’s first rappel on the bridge, he takes it very slow, which is okay as it gives him time to enjoy the view.
The world’s most dangerous bridge?
An evening pause: A different kind of bridge, located in Russia and one that I wouldn’t speed across. Built originally as a railroad bridge to cross the Vitim River, it is 1870 feet long and about 50 feet above the water. Note how many of the cross planks are not attached.
Duct tape suspension bridge built by the students of Dublin High School Engineering and Design Academy in California
Toaster purse
Phil Collins -In the air tonight
Antonio Breschi – Jig in the Castle
An evening pause: An Irish jig morphs into some wild and spectacular improv.
Antonio Breschi on the piano, Mairtin O’Connor, accordion, Johnny MacCarthy, flute, Jane Cassidy, bazouki, and Steve Cooney, bass. Recorded in Belfast around 1990.
Breschi by the way is probably one of the world’s best improvisational pianists.
Canadian Brass performing live in China
Art Of Noise – Robinson Crusoe
An evening pause: Music by Art of Noise, inspired by the soundtrack from the 1960s television show, Robinson Crusoe.
The video has some incredible stop-action cloud sequences.
Dueling Banjos
An evening pause: Bob Anthonioz (as Hardy) on the guitar and Philippe Bourgeois (as Laurel) on the banjo.
My Music Cube
Virgil Thomson – Finale, The River
Chopin’s Etude in Gb Major
Tony Banks – The waters of Lethe
Richard Rogers – Edelweiss
An evening pause: From The Sound of Music (1965). The context: The Nazis have taken over Austria, and plan to arrest Captain Georg Ludwig von Trapp and his family at the end of this concert. This lovely song, Edelweiss, is initially sung by von Trapp as a farewell to his nation. As the song unfolds, however, it becomes instead a song of defiance against the Nazis, by the von Trapps and the audience.
Always, always, we must stand for freedom.
Antonin Dvorak – From the New World, Symphony #9, 2nd movement
An evening pause: The most beautiful melody from the second movement of Antonin Dvorak’s 9th Symphony, “From the New World,” performed here by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Andris Nelsons.
Shanthi the elephant plays the harmonica.
An evening pause: An elephant playing an harmonica? As Shakespeare said, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,/Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”