jvjv at posthaven

To (p. v)
MR. THEODORE ROOSEVELT
WHO WHILE PRESIDENT WAS NOT TOO BUSY TO
TURN ASIDE—CHEERFULLY AND EFFECTIVELY—AND
AID WORKERS IN THE FIELD OF AMERICAN
BALLADRY, THIS VOLUME IS GRATEFULLY
DEDICATED

(p. vii)

Cheyenne
Aug 28th 1910

Dear Mr. Lomax,

You have done a work emphatically worth doing and one which should appeal to the people of all our country, but particularly to the people of the west and southwest. Your subject is not only exceedingly interesting to the student of literature, but also to the student of the general history of the west. There is something very curious in the reproduction here on this new continent of essentially the conditions of ballad-growth which obtained in mediæval England; including, by the way, sympathy for the outlaw, Jesse James taking the place of Robin Hood. Under modern conditions however, the native ballad is speedily killed by competition with the music hall songs; the cowboys becoming ashamed to sing the crude homespun ballads in view of what Owen Writes calls the "ill-smelling saloon cleverness" (p. viii) of the far less interesting compositions of the music-hall singers. It is therefore a work of real importance to preserve permanently this unwritten ballad literature of the back country and the frontier.

With all good wishes, I am

very truly yours
Theodore Roosevelt

John Lomax dedicated his collection of Cowboy songs to Teddy Roosevelt in recognition of support received. This letter from Roosevelt opens the book.

488. The Harp that Once Through Tara’s Halls

Thomas Moore (1779–1852)

THE HARP that once through Tara’s halls   The soul of music shed, Now hangs as mute on Tara’s walls   As if that soul were fled. So sleeps the pride of former days,         5   So glory’s thrill is o’er, And hearts, that once beat high for praise,   Now feel that pulse no more.   No more to chiefs and ladies bright   The harp of Tara swells:         10 The chord alone, that breaks at night,   Its tale of ruin tells. Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes,   The only throb she gives, Is when some heart indignant breaks,         15   To show that still she lives.

May this never be our lament.

Because this round is so complex, separate image and sound files are provided for each part. The first two images are for four of the six voices.

  The first line for four voices:

Superb presentation of this round. And his translation seems right. This is the basis, the bare bones music. The midi instruments are not much, but the point is to listen to the pitch and rhythm and the interplay during the round part rather than to get lost in the immediate sensation of the sound. Platonic idealism, maybe.

Sumer is Icumen In.wmv

From The Wicker Man, I think. Very strange ironic mood.

Sumer is Icumen in (The Hilliard Ensemble)

Magnificent, professional, authentic and clear. This is the way to hear it, methinks. It gets you happy, like the lyric.

Sumer is icumen in (The Hastings College Choir)

Faces in books, but the whole works well. Young folks doing well...

Circulus - Sumer Is Icumen In

You can hear the Middle Eastern influence in the shawm, the double reed instrument at the start... Energetic, but modernized.

The "Library of Southern Literature" includes a wide range of literary works of the American South published before 1924. This collection was originally based on Dr. Robert Bain's bibliography of the hundred most important southern literary works and continues to expand under the guidance of scholarly advisors Dr. Joseph M. Flora and Dr. William L. Andrews. This collection begins with some of the earliest texts about America written by British discoverers that set the foundation for American letters and traces the development of southern literature through to the beginning of the twentieth century.

• Introduction
• Browse this Collection Alphabetically
• Browse Images by Subject
• Dr. Robert Bain's original bibliography of Southern Literature
• About this Collection

A treasure trove.

Let’s talk population trends.  Many readers are familiar with the arresting Golden State statistics cited by a Wall Street Journal article in March:

From the mid-1980s to 2005, California’s population grew by 10 million, while Medicaid recipients soared by seven million; tax filers paying income taxes rose by just 150,000; and the prison population swelled by 115,000.

The net gain in tax filers includes the author:  I was added as a tax-paying filer to the California income tax rolls in 2004.  Apparently there are another 149,999 of us, and I’m thinking we need a T-shirt.  (And yes, alert readers, I understand that this was a net gain, reflecting both additions to and subtractions from the tax rolls over time.  Just having some fun with these sad little numbers.)

Ponder that, my friends. And you wonder what happened to the middle class in this country?

Naches - Fun der chupe

Nice English Concertina work by Prof. Novotny.