#Episcopal Music notes
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Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones, known as Sissieretta Jones, (January 5, 1868 or 1869[1] – June 24, 1933[2]) was an African-American soprano. She sometimes was called “The Black Patti” in reference to Italian opera singerAdelina Patti. Jones’ repertoire included grand opera, light opera, and popular music.[3]
Matilda Sissieretta Joyner was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, United States, to Jeremiah Malachi Joyner, an African Methodist Episcopal minister, and Henrietta Beale.[2] By 1876 her family moved to Providence, Rhode Island,[4]where she began singing at an early age in her father’s Pond Street Baptist Church.[2]
In 1883, Joyner began the formal study of music at the Providence Academy of Music. The same year she married David Richard Jones, a news dealer and hotel bellman. In the late 1880s, Jones was accepted at the New England Conservatory of Music.[1] On October 29, 1885, Jones gave a solo performance in Providence as an opening act to a production of Richard IIIput on by John A. Arneaux‘s theatre troupe.[5] In 1887, she performed at Boston’s Music Hall before an audience of 5,000.[2]
Jones made her New York debut on April 5, 1888, at Steinway Hall.[1] During a performance at Wallack’s Theater in New York, Jones came to the attention of Adelina Patti’s manager, who recommended that Jones tour the West Indies with the Fisk Jubilee Singers.[2] Jones made successful tours of the Caribbean in 1888 and 1892.[1]
In February 1892, Jones performed at the White House for PresidentBenjamin Harrison.[2] She eventually sang for four consecutive presidents — Harrison, Grover Cleveland, William McKinley, and Theodore Roosevelt— and the British royal family.[1][2][3]
Jones performed at the Grand Negro Jubilee at New York’s Madison Square Garden in April 1892 before an audience of 75,000. She sang the song “Swanee River” and selections from La traviata.[3] She was so popular that she was invited to perform at the Pittsburgh Exposition (1892) and the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago (1893).[4]
In June 1892, Jones became the first African-American to sing at the Music Hall in New York (renamed Carnegie Hall the following year).[1][7] Among the selections in her program were Charles Gounod‘s “Ave Maria” and Giuseppe Verdi‘s “Sempre libera” (from La traviata).[1] The New York Echowrote of her performance at the Music Hall: “If Mme Jones is not the equal of Adelina Patti, she at least can come nearer it than anything the American public has heard. Her notes are as clear as a mockingbird’s and her annunciation perfect.”[1] On June 8, 1892, her career elevated beyond primary ethnic communities, and was furthered when she received a contract, with the possibility of a two-year extension, for $150 per week (plus expenses) with Mayor James B. Pond, who had meaningful affiliations to many authors and musicians.[8] The company Troubadours made an important statement about the capabilities of black performers, that besides minstrelsy, there were other areas of genre and style.[8]
In 1893, Jones met composer Antonín Dvořák, and in January 1894 she performed parts of his Symphony No. 9 at Madison Square Garden. Dvořák wrote a solo part for Jones.[1]
Jones met with international success. Besides the United States and the West Indies, Jones toured in South America, Australia, India, and southern Africa.[1] During a European tour in 1895 and 1896, Jones performed in London, Paris, Berlin, Cologne, Munich, Milan, and Saint Petersburg.[9]
In 1896, Jones returned to Providence to care for her mother, who had become ill.[1] Jones found that access to most American classical concert halls was limited by racism. She formed the Black Patti Troubadours (later renamed the Black Patti Musical Comedy Company), a musical and acrobatic act made up of 40 jugglers, comedians, dancers and a chorus of 40 trained singers.[2] The Indianapolis Freeman reviewed the “Black Patti Troubadours” with the following: “The rendition which she and the entire company give of this reportorial opera selection is said to be incomparably grand. Not only is the solo singing of the highest order, but the choruses are rendered with a spirit and musical finish which never fail to excite genuine enthusiasm.[10]
The revue paired Jones with rising vaudeville composers Bob Cole and Billy Johnson. The show consisted of a musical skit, followed by a series of short songs and acrobatic performances. During the final third of each show, Jones performed arias and operatic excerpts.[9] The revue provided Jones with a comfortable income, reportedly in excess of $20,000 per year. She led the company with reassurance of a forty-week season that would give her a sustainable income, guaranteed lodging in a well-appointed and stylish Pullman car, and the ability to sing opera and operetta excerpts in the final section of the show.[8] This allowed Jones to be the highest paid African American performer of her time.[8] Jones sung passionately and pursued her career choice of opera and different repertory regardless to her lack of audience attendance.[8] For more than two decades, Jones remained the star of the Famous Troubadours, while they graciously toured every season and established their popularity in the principal cities of the United States and Canada.[11] Although their eventual fame and international tours collected many audiences, they began with a “free-for-all” variety production with plenty of “low” comedy, song and dance, and no pretense of a coherent story line.[12]
Several members of the troupe, such as Bert Williams, went on to become famous.[1] April 1908, at the Avenue Theatre in Louisville, Kentucky, an audience made up mostly of whites (segregated seating was still prevalent), accepted Madam ‘Patti’ after singing ‘My Old Kentucky Home’ with much respect and admiration, and marked “the first time that a colored performer received a bouquet at the theatre in this city”.[12] For almost ten years, racial segregation had kept Jones from the mainstream opera platform, but by singing selections from operas within the context of a hard-traveling minstrel and variety show, she was still able to utilize her gifted voice, that people of all races loved.[12] The Black Patti Troubadours reveled in vernacular music and dance.[12]
Jones retired from performing in 1915 because her mother fell ill, so she moved back to Rhode Island to take care of her. For more than two decades, Jones remained the star of the Famous Troubadours, while they graciously toured every season and established their popularity in the principal cities of the United States and Canada.[12] She devoted the remainder of her life to her church and to caring for her mother. Jones was forced to sell most of her property to survive.[1][2] She died in poverty on June 24, 1933 from cancer. She is buried in her hometown at Grace Church Cemetery.[2]
In 2013 Jones was inducted into the Rhode Island Music Hall of Fame.[13]
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matilda_Sissieretta_Joyner_Jones
Photos from Wiki Commons
#sissieretta black patti jones#blackherstory#black womens history#lightopera#popularmusic#grandopera
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As I walked out one evening
2018. 6 min. SSATB
Ensemble: SSATB
Duration: 6 min.
Written: December 2018
Written for: Nightingale
Premiere: May 10, 2019 | St. Peter's Episcopal, Cambridge, MA
Publisher: Nos Leiras Music
Piece Notes: Auden’s poem deals with the dichotomy between what is eternal and what is temporary. As there are three distinct voices in this poem — the narrator, the lover, and the clocks, the music represents characteristics of all three. The narrator stands alone, an observer, while the lover’s lavish words resound and reverberate in the hollowness of the archway, twisting and turning over themselves. However, when the message of temporality is introduced by the clocks, all time ceases and a sense of emptiness is infused into the vocalism, with periods of silence that seem to grow longer and longer. This also serves to juxtapose the lover’s image of endlessness, reflected in the flourishes of the imitated figure, with contextually disruptive cadences. This piece is meant to depict our inherent longing for eternity, whether that be through love, art, or salvation, while maintaining the truth that we are finite, as is all that we bring with us.
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Washington Post: Why are we so tolerant of churchy bigotry? via /r/atheism
Washington Post: Why are we so tolerant of churchy bigotry?
Excerpt below.
Full article available here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/03/06/religious-bigotry-lgbtq-homophobia/
By Kate Cohen Contributing columnist
When one of my kids was 12, he was invited to join an esteemed local choir, one of the crown jewels of Albany’s Episcopal Cathedral of All Saints. Although he was an atheist, he didn’t object to singing Christian music — years in children’s choruses and “holiday” concerts had accustomed him to that.
But as I, high on maternal pride, was calculating how I’d get him to two rehearsals a week, he asked me whether the church condoned same-sex marriage. I said I didn’t know. He said, well, if they didn’t, he wouldn’t join.
I checked: They most emphatically did not. When I told the choirmaster why my son was declining the invitation, he responded that progressive forces inside the church were working toward change. I wished him well. Even if their efforts succeeded, the change would no doubt arrive after my son’s tenure as an angel-voiced advertisement for a discriminatory institution.
Are you impressed by the moral clarity I expressed … after having been schooled by a seventh-grader?
I thought of this moment when I read that last month, Pensacola Christian College in Florida had disinvited the King’s Singers — an a cappella group visiting campus — two hours before their scheduled performance. The college canceled, it later said, “upon learning that one of the artists openly maintained a lifestyle that contradicts Scripture.” In other words, because one of its members was gay.
In fact, two are. The King’s Singers knew about the college’s position on homosexuality when they agreed to play there, but as they explained in an Instagram post: “Our belief is that music can build a common language that allows people with different views and perspectives to come together.”
It’s an extremely gracious statement. Yet I have to ask them, as I belatedly asked myself years ago: Why so tolerant of bigotry?
Are we just so accustomed to the anti-LGBTQ stances of conservative religious institutions that they don’t even register? Are we so used to church-sponsored homophobia that we ignore the vast, forbidding landscape of prejudice while celebrating the tiniest signs of change?
It made the news, for example, when Pope Francis told the Associated Press recently that homosexuality should not be criminalized, as it is in 67 countries, and urged bishops around the world to recognize everyone’s dignity. Amen.
He noted, however, that homosexuality is still a sin. The Catholic Church will keep calling it a sin, and urging sinners to repent, and it will keep refusing to recognize same-sex marriage or to condone adoption by same-sex parents, but in a way that also totally recognizes their dignity!
(Not for nothing: Where does the pope think those countries first got the idea that homosexuality should be a crime?)
In January, the Church of England apologized for its treatment of LGBTQ people while clarifying that such people would not be allowed to marry in the church. “For the times we have rejected or excluded you, and those you love, we are deeply sorry,” the pastoral letter reads. And for the times we will continue to reject or exclude you, we are so deeply sorry for those, too!
These official church statements represent genteel, soft-spoken prejudice in God’s name. For a more brutal version, take a look (if you can stomach it) at Hemant Mehta’s recent roundup of “Christian hate preachers,” each opining on video that gay people should be executed. It’s horrifying.
Of course, many progressive churches — and synagogues and mosques — welcome their LGBTQ siblings as full and equal members. And many that don’t yet will get there eventually.
The Episcopal Church, for example, now officially sanctions same-sex marriage. And the Albany diocese — well, it’s working on it. A statement on the Episcopal Church website notes: “As with all spiritual journeys, everyone walks at their own pace. Some Episcopal congregations are actively involved in LGBTQ ministry and their arms are open wide; others are more reserved, but their doors are still open to all; some are still wrestling with their beliefs and feelings.”
Fair enough, right?
Now, let’s pretend that instead of talking about LGBTQ people, the church was talking about congregations “wrestling with their beliefs and feelings” about Black people. Would our spirit of patient forbearance extend to that?
Not too long ago,
Submitted March 07, 2023 at 04:07AM by bitemy
(From Reddit https://ift.tt/4bemGDP)
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Will Trump be President again?
9/13/2022
Pastoral Articles, North America, United States of America, Eagles Saving Nations
On June 20, 2022, Israel's government fell. On July 7, 2022, Britain's government collapsed. Now, The United States of America is in the process of collapsing due to the same problems that forced the collapse of Britain and Israel's governments; bad leadership. We are literally being destroyed intentionally by Socialist, Communist leaders. They hate fundamental Christians who believe the Bible is literally the Word of God. They are trying to take the God of the Bible out of America by attacking its authority through false science, evolution, religion and heresies now taught in most churches.
The Emergent Church lies and teaches that the Bible is evolving. They teach that Jesus is not against homosexuality and other sins condemned in scriptures because scripture is evolving. With this heresy, a person does not need a pastor any longer because a psychologist or evolutionist states the same thing.
The main line churches such as Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Lutheran, and United Methodist support a person wanting an abortion, cohabitation (sex before marriage) etc. The Communist organization known as The Federal Council of Churches is the forerunner of the National Council of Churches (NCC) with its Geneva parent organization, the World Council of Churches. The NCC leads dozens of Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican denominations, including the Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Evangelical Lutheran, United Methodist and many others. Since the NCC has a Marxist heritage, it explains why they have backed liberation theology. This should clearly explain why the main line churches are not bothered with sin, but instead support many sins of abomination. Many politicians attend these churches as they are not challenged with their own immorality and vices.
New York Post by Patrick Reilly, August 3, 2022 headline news read: "Students at ritzy NYC high school forced to attend drag show in church: report Students at a ritzy Manhattan private school were reportedly forced to attend a drag show at church as part of its LGBTQ+ pride celebrations earlier this year...Grace Church High School - a progressive independent Episcopal school...invited renowned New York City drag queen Brita Filter to its sixth annual "Pride Chapel" event for a live performance on April 27...Brita, whose real name is Jesse Havea, performed a rendition of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." The artist then sat down with the school's queer director of vocal music, Andrew Leonard, to answer students' questions about drag performing, queerness and the importance of pride, according to the school. Video posted on TikTok shows Filter entering the back of the church in full drag, dancing up the aisle in a short-cut orange and blue dress and matching go-go boots as students clapped and cheered him on from the pews."
NOTE: Are you getting an idea how serious the situation in America is and how the church itself, for the most part, has become totally ineffective and actually part of the spiritual problem?
The Philadelphia Trumpet, September 2022 states, "the fact that elderly people elected a president who appointed some conservative justices does not mean that the American people as a whole are repenting of their sins and becoming more virtuous. In fact, the statistics indicate just the opposite. Despite the court rulings, Americans are more lascivious than ever. A May 2022 Gallup Poll shows that 76 percent of Americans think fornication is morally acceptable, 71 percent believe homosexual relations are proper, and 52 percent think abortion is permissible...In 2014, a Pew Research Religious Landscape Survey found that only 51 percent of millennials are sure God exists, compared to about 70 percent of baby boomers who believe there is a Creator...Only 20 percent of millennials believe the Bible is the literal Word of God, compared to 35 percent of baby boomers who believe 'all scripture is given by inspiration of God.'...The views of today's conservatives would have been considered radically liberal not long ago...most Republicans now support same-sex marriage, and many are warming up to transgenderism. They too are racing into immorality, in blatant violations of the laws in the Bible....the schools are liberal, the business elites are liberal, the media moguls are liberal, the Hollywood producers are liberal, the songwriters are liberal, the Republicans are liberal and even the churches are liberal."
Statistics from the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University, May 12, 2022. "A new nationwide survey of America's Christian pastors shows that a majority of pastors lack a biblical worldview...37% possess a biblical worldview and the majority - 62% - hold a hybrid worldview known as Syncretism...Senior Pastors, for instance, 41% hold a biblical worldview...28% among Associate Pastors...12% of Children's and Youth Pastors."
NOTE: Jesus warned when He returns, will he find faith? Truly the church is compromised, polluted, sick and crying for judgment to fall. No politician is going to save America.
I believe if 2 Kings 14:26-28 is applicable to President Donald Trump, and he being a type of King Jeroboam II, Trump will become the President of The United States again. This alone will not save America. I believe there would be a reprieve as he puts America first and attempts to protect our Constitution and Bill of Rights. He would certainly make America stronger again, but King Jeroboam II was not a righteous man. He did evil in the sight of God and committed the same sins that the first Jeroboam committed.
Even though President Trump was a great conservative President and truly loves America, he also has accepted homosexuality and had these people in his administration. Being a conservative alone doesn't save America permanently.
Realize: Four sins bring judgment on a nation; idolatry, immorality, killing the innocent and dividing the land of Israel. America is guilty of all four of these sins. Even if Trump becomes President of America again, he will not save America because he has accepted some of these sins, just as the Republican Party has done. No politician is going to save America, only the bride of Christ can save this nation if she repents of her sins.
2 Chronicles 7:14 Then if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and restore their land.
THERE COMES A POINT OF NO RETURN!
Judah's Persistent Idolatry
Jeremiah 7:16 "Pray no more for these people, Jeremiah. Do not weep or pray for them, and don't beg me to help them, for I will not listen to you.
Jeremiah 11:11-14 Therefore, this is what the LORD says: I am going to bring calamity upon them, and they will not escape. Though they beg for mercy, I will not listen to their cries. Then the people of Judah and Jerusalem will pray to their idols and burn incense before them. But the idols will not save them when disaster strikes! Look now, people of Judah; you have as many gods as you have towns. You have as many altars of shame--altars for burning incense to your god Baal--as there are streets in Jerusalem. "Pray no more for these people, Jeremiah. Do not weep or pray for them, for I will not listen to them when they cry out to me in distress.
Jeremiah 30:12-15 KJV For thus saith the LORD, Thy bruise is incurable, and thy wound is grievous. There is none to plead thy cause, that thou mayest be bound up: thou hast no healing medicines. All thy lovers have forgotten thee; they seek thee not; for I have wounded thee with the wound of an enemy, with the chastisement of a cruel one, for the multitude of thine iniquity; because thy sins were increased. Why criest thou for thine affliction? thy sorrow is incurable for the multitude of thine iniquity: because thy sins were increased, I have done these things unto thee.
Ezekiel 5:11-12 Wherefore, as I live, saith the Lord GOD; Surely, because thou hast defiled my sanctuary with all thy detestable things, and with all thine abominations, therefore will I also diminish thee; neither shall mine eye spare, neither will I have any pity. A third part of thee shall die with the pestilence, and with famine shall they be consumed in the midst of thee: and a third part shall fall by the sword round about thee; and I will scatter a third part into all the winds, and I will draw out a sword after them.
Genesis 6:5-7 And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.
NOTE: God destroyed the inhabitants of the world in Noah's day because the cup of iniquity was full!
Genesis 15:13-16 And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.
NOTE: There is the Full Cup of Iniquity time table established by God called, THE SCIENCE OF JUDGMENT, which is the title of my book on this subject. God does not give Abraham's descendants the land until after the Amorites had failed to repent. They took advantage of God's mercy, compassion and grace, and therefore received God's judgment. God is the same for all peoples. Judgment only comes after the man continues in sin instead of repenting, thus filling the cup of iniquity and bringing on God's wrath! Remember that ancient Israel's possession of Canaan was based on the same conditions applicable to the Amorites!
Since March 2020, I have had 25 dreams warning of civil unrest, civil war and an invasion.
Matt Shea; former member of WA State House of Representatives, has warned on my Warning Radio programs that nuclear war is coming. We are in a communist takeover right now and our enemies are watching and plotting to attack. China is threatening to invade Taiwan, North Korea is ready to invade South Korea, and Russia, along with China, is ready to go to war with America.
Dear saints: I have had so many professionals, including lawmen, attorneys and politicians on my Warning Radio and TV programs. They all warn that we are on the verge of civil war, yet the church is compromised, asleep, dysfunctional and fearful. Do you realize the Biden administration has taken away so many of our freedoms, just as Communist do, in the name of justice and safety? They are the ones promoting hatred and name calling. They castigate people that disagree with them as Nazis, hate filled domestic terrorists that need to be stopped. Yet, for two years prior to the 2020 Presidential Election, BLM (Marxist) and Antifa (revolutionist) were burning down and looting businesses, even killing people. These same politicians protected them as they openly engaged in criminal behavior.
We must have another Great Awakening to stop imminent persecution, bondage and slavery. Please subscribe to Eagles Saving Nations to help me get the power of God back in the church which occurred at Pentecost and is commanded and promised to all believers. This is the only way the church can have the power, strength, boldness and supernatural manifestations of the Holy Spirit operating through them, to lead a revival in America.
If we don't have another Great Awakening, we will witness a national collapse, foreign invasion, suffering, starvation, incarceration, slavery and death of the righteous. Unfortunately, out of this horrible pain and suffering, another Great Awakening will arise out of the ashes with revival sweeping over the remainder of The United States of America.
Please pray for me and support my ministry financially so we can continue to sound the alarm without compromise. We need your help to continue to be a voice in the wilderness as our finances have dwindled. Call 360-629-5248, go to my web site at www.worldministries.org or send a check in the mail made out to WMI, PO Box 277, Stanwood, WA, 98292 to make a donation. May God richly bless you.
Ladies and gentlemen: Did you watch and listen to President Joe Biden's speech in Philadelphia? If you did not, please Read: Transcript of President Joe Biden's speech in Philadelphia by Bob D'Angelo, Cox Media Group National Content Desk, September 01, 2022 at 10:54 pm CDT...The president, using a prime-time address, called the midterm elections a "battle for the soul of this nation." He added that Republicans who support Trump "thrive on chaos."
Before Biden's speech, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said that Democrats were "dismantling Americans' democracy before our very eyes." McCarthy called on Biden to apologize for invoking fascism to describe the ideology of Trump and his supporters. We are in desperate trouble as liberals seem to be following the Communist playbook to attack their opponents and topple their nation as in Germany.
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Design Your Own
"Above The World"
Characters
-wendy
eMOVIE
Above The World I, II, III
Casting call for an entire
To get started:
Who are you!
Below you will find simple questions about you as you are. (S)
These questions can then be answered as if you are who you would like to be. A wished for personality.
This imagined you can be a hero or a villain or a victim or a simply a just hoped for you based on anything you identify as this character of you. (NSS)
The next personality character to design are the people around you. Fill out the survey as you see them for themselves. (NSO)
Then the same questions can be answered as if they are who you would like them to be--a wished for personality (NSIO).
How to design your personality
Above The World Characters:
Fill in your surveys:
Perspective Possibilities:
• Self (S)
• Not Self Self (NSS)
you as an imagined self
• Not Self Other (NSO)
someone else as precieved by you
• Self Imagined Other (NSIO)
someone else as you imagine you want them to be
Name:
•Attribute:
Age:
•Health:
•Features:
•Career:
•Hobbies:
•Food:
•Drinks:
•Sports:
•Clothing:
•Shoes:
•Religion:
•Personalty
Meyers Briggs:
Test Result
Take online test
https://www.16personalities.com/personality-types
(Examples)
1. Self Analysis:
Who you think you are as yourself according to the Meyer Briggs sixteen personality types.
2. Take the test to get your Meyers Briggs online results.
Example:
A Protagonist (ENFJ) is a person with the Extraverted, Intuitive, Feeling, and Judging personality traits.
These warm, forthright types love helping others, and they tend to have strong ideas and values. They back their perspective with the creative energy to achieve their goals.
Your test results:
Logician
https://www.16personalities.com/intp-personality
Write
Your Character in a Situation or Scene:
Example
Place: Death Valley Mile High Dune
People: Wendy Anna Jones (NSS) Matth Foo (NS)
Situation: Sunset on top of the dune. Warm air after a hot day. No sound. No conversation. Staring at the dessert. A flock of butterflies come into view. Surround the two of us. A moment. Another moment, and then they are gone over the dune.
(Note to Foo: I lived in Austin for a moment. Rented an apartment in "The Orleans" near Central Market. It snowed in the back yard and then got very hot. I couldn't stop screaming. Very unlike me. I couldn't stay. As I crossed the boarderline, the screaming instantly stopped. Like a reverse startle: screaming...silence. I didn't know what to make of it, but I knew I couldn't stay.
-wendy)
eGAME
to be continued...
#quantumtalkbeg🐝
•Broadcast
Command:
Action:
Body Frequency:
Examples:
Self (S)
Wendy
•Attribute:
Cooperative, dominates when not submitting, generous, intelligent, happy
Age: 58 (2022)
•Health: generally good, TBI, bipolar 1, foot damage, body wounds
•Features: 5' 7", #155 shaved, unnatural color, high cheekboned face, cute in looks, child like in appearance
•Career: Writer, Teacher, Technologist, Healer, Philosopher
•Hobbies: Travel, Online Research, Cooking, Music, Improv Artist, Interaction Designer
•Food: Vegetables, fish, International, restaurants: from whole in the wall to five star, Taco Bell
•Drinks: Tea, mineral water, Coke, beer, wine, soy milk
•Sports: Watches fly fishing, goes to the YMCA, swims, yoga
•Clothing: linen, cotten, silk, Nordstroms, Out of the Closet, Boutique
•Shoes: cowboots
•Religion: Zen Buddhist, Episcopal
•Personalty
Meyers Briggs:
(Examples)
Self Analysis
Architect
https://www.16personalities.com/intj-personality
Logician
https://www.16personalities.com/intp-personality
Consul
https://www.16personalities.com/esfj-personality
Test Result
Take online test
https://www.16personalities.com/personality-types
Broadcast
Command:
Action:
Body Frequency:
Not Self Self (NSS)
Name: Wendy Anna Jones
•Attribute: Engineer, Mrs Mciver, mechanical, camper,
Age: 30 - 100
•Health: Perfect
•Features: 5'7" #135 athletic, muscular, red hair, cheekboned face, cute in looks, child like in appearance, perfect body, feet, hands
•Career: Teacher, Technologist, Writer, Interaction Design, Painter...
•Hobbies: Reading, Baking, Traveling, Repairs...
•Food: Steak, Barbecue Chicken Pizza, Dessert, Coleslaw...
•Drinks: Scotch
•Sports: Tennis
•Clothing: Jeans, Tshirts, leather, no bra
•Shoes: cowboy boots
•Religion: me
•Personalty
Meyers Briggs:
(Examples)
Self Analysis
A Protagonist (ENFJ) is a person with the Extraverted, Intuitive, Feeling, and Judging personality traits. These warm, forthright types love helping others, and they tend to have strong ideas and values. They back their perspective with the creative energy to achieve their goals.
Test Result:
Take online test
https://www.16personalities.com/personality-types
eGAME
to be continued...
#quantumtalkbeg🐝
•Broadcast
Command:
Action:
Body Frequency:
Not Self Other (NSO)
Name: Dori
•Attribute:
1. attacks and does not give support, dominates at all times, bitter
Age: 36 (2022)
2. Features: 5' 6.5", #155 long light brown hair, square stern face, not unattractive in looks, bitter and dominating in nature
•Career: Nurse
•Hobbies: crafts, tv
•Food: frozen microwave, convenience and fast food, restaurants: Olive Garden, TGI's, DQ
•Drinks: Diet cola, water
•Sports: Watches football, goes to the gym
•Clothing: Shops at Ross, Walmart, Amazon
•Shoes: sneakers,
•Personality: Meyers Briggs: Commander, exp: repeats your name in a condescending tone to dominate, puts self serving needs first
https://www.16personalities.com/entj-personality
eGAME
to be continued...
#quantumtalkbeg🐝
•Broadcast
Command:
Action:
Body Frequency:
If you can not think of yourself as an imagined self here are a few suggestions to draw upon:
Familize yourself with how you see yourself in relationship to D.C. Comics Characters
(Sandman, Xmen, Justice League, Terminator, Conan...) and any other source from real life personalities, past and present day, (Benjamin Franklin, , Neil Armstrong, Don Cornelius, Helen Kellar, Gangus Khan, Nepolian, Ed Gians, Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, Sen no Rikyu, Zhang Daqian, Confucius, Lao Tzu, and Sun Tzu, Murasaki Shikibu... [so many more please help me in the comments]) movies, books and character treatments from anything you identify with.
Underdeveloped:
To be continued...
eGAME
to be continued...
#quantumtalkbeg🐝
•Broadcast
Command:
Action:
Body Frequency:
eSCHOOL
to be continued...
#quantumtalkbes🐝
Ways to express your characteristic:
1. Collage of the character paper or electronic design
2. Write a description
3. Write a song or mix
4. Speak to text (keep voice recording)
5. Photo series
6. Costume and Fashion
7. Draw, paint, scalp your character
8. Video(s)
9. Location scouting where your character would be scene
10. Food, drink, eating habits,
11. History, education, careers choices, hobbies, skills, habits, traits, family
12. Age range, siamese twins, orphan, weight, condition
Find character description from films you may be familiar with on Script Lab .com with the difference being the more the better!
https://thescriptlab.com/blogs/15648-best-character-descriptions-screenplays/
These characters go unseen in the world: polition, jeweler, property developer, attorney, city worker, customer service, park ranger, preacher, lyft driver, restaurant owner, student, couchsurfer, FedEx driver... whatever you do or would like to do, include it.
THE QUANTUMTALK BEE
#quantumtalkbee🐝
UNIVERSAL NEWSPAPER
BEE MAGAZINE
-wendy
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Trinity Sunday
♫ Music Notes
Trinity Sunday is unique in the Church Year in that it is the only Sunday devoted to a theological concept. The rest of the year narrates the stories of Jesus’ coming and birth, death and exaltation, or his ministry of healing and teaching. Both the Epistle and Gospel readings speak of the relationship between the persons of the Trinity.
Today’s hymns likewise reflect on the idea of God expressed in the persons of the Trinity:
· “Holy, holy, holy!”(H-362 Nicaea): Probably the best known hymn associated with this day, and a classic example of Victorian hymnody, this tune is named for the city in Asia Minor (and near the capital of the Roman Empire in Constantinople, now Istanbul) where the famous Council of Nicaea met in ce 325 to define the doctrine of the Trinity in the form we know as the Nicene Creed.
· “Holy God, we praise thy Name” (H-366 Grosser Gott): This German hymn is a metrical version (i.e., in the form of hymn) of the canticle Te Deum laudamus, itself another expression of the nature of God coming from the early Church. See p. 95 in the BCP.
· “I bind unto myself today” (H-370 St. Patrick’s Breastplate): The text has been attributed to St. Patrick since the year ce 690. It is an example of a “lorica” or breastplate prayer, chanted while dressing oneself and calling on God for protection in the face of danger.
Twice this morning we will hear music by the mystic Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179). Her feast day in the Episcopal Church is celebrated on September 17. Hildegard’s music has become very popular in recent years, even including arrangements I heard back in the 1990’s on popular radio stations and the dance floor of the disco. She is one of the most interesting women in history: abbess, theologian, preacher, musician, poet, doctor and pharmacist. She is the first woman composer for which we have her actual music. As a mystic and visionary her ecological and holistic spirituality speaks prophetically to our time. Again, far ahead of her time, she uses feminine language for God as “creatrix omnium” (as an English translation says, “Mother Great Creator of all things living”)
Today’s prelude, O viridissima virga: And from then on there was food for human beings, is an arrangement from Hildegard’s chants. This chant to the Blessed Virgin Mary compares her to a green branch, sweet with the smell of a balsam fir, from whose womb came eternal spiritual food (the body of Christ) for all the world. So this music weaves a connection between the creation story of Genesis and our sharing at the Holy Table of the Eucharist. If you would like to hear more of Hildegard’s O viridissima virga you can go on YouTube for a solo voice version at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2Og0uasO7o, or a version with female voices accompanied by medieval instruments at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz60gG4wEL8.
During communion the choir will sing a motet using another chant by Hildegard of Bingen, Laus Trinitati. A simple version of this can be heard, again on YouTube, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KUICvzM6DQ. For an even more interesting version listen to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQLLghurcdE. This one is highly mystical, with an amazing accompaniment.
In this chant Hildegard reflects on the image of the Trinity through principal theme of life—vita—first within the Trinity and then in God’s creation. Three times the chant repeats the word life with a cascade of descending notes. She uses a trinity of images—sound, life, and creatrix (feminine version of the noun for creator)—yet doesn’t explain how this relates to the theological description of God as Trinity.
The Rev. Dr. David Kerr Park, Director of Music
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ART MASTERPOST for Somewhere
It has been such a joy to illustrate this fic for @foolondahill17 as a part of the @deancasbigbang. West Side Story is my absolute favorite musical and they did such a fabulous job capturing the essence of that show in this story. There are so many satisfying Easter eggs snuck into this fic from the show it is just *chefs kiss* perfection.
(Please click on each image for more detail)
When You’re a Hunter *snap*
In The Clouds
Please take note of the stained glass panels, which are based off of the Tiffany stained glass windows depicting St. Michael’s Victory in Heaven in St. Michael’s Episcopal Church in the upper west side of Manhattan. I couldn’t be any more extra if I tried ;)
A Place For Us
The heartbreak! The tragedy! Oh these two just wound me. That’s all I’ve got for you. Please enjoy this beautiful story :)
#dcbb 2020#supernatural#destiel#dean winchester#castiel#spn#supernatural fanart#spn fanart#west side story#West Side Story AU
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Today, the Church remembers Theodore of Tarsus (602– 19 September 690 AD) was the Archbishop of Canterbury from 668 to 690 AD, and is best known for his reform of the English Church and establishment of a school in Canterbury.
Ora pro nobis.
Theodore's life can be divided into the time before his arrival in Britain as Archbishop of Canterbury, and his archiepiscopate. Until recently, scholarship on Theodore had focused on only the latter period since it is attested in Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English, and also in Stephen of Ripon's Vita Sancti Wilfrithi, whereas no source directly mentions Theodore's earlier activities.
Theodore was of Byzantine Greek descent, born in Tarsus in Cilicia, a Greek-speaking diocese of the Byzantine Empire. Theodore's childhood saw devastating wars between Byzantium and the Persian Sassanid Empire, which resulted in the capture of Antioch, Damascus, and Jerusalem in 613-614 AD. Persian forces captured Tarsus when Theodore was 11 or 12 years old, and evidence exists that Theodore had experience of Persian culture. It is most likely that he studied at Antioch, the historic home of a distinctive school of exegesis, of which he was a proponent. Theodore also knew Syrian culture, language and literature, and may even have travelled to Edessa, Armenia.
Though a Greek could live under Persian rule, the Muslim conquests, which reached Tarsus in 637, certainly drove Theodore from Tarsus; if he did not flee earlier, Theodore would have been 35 years old when he left his birthplace. Having returned to the Eastern Roman Empire, he studied in the Byzantine capital of Constantinople, including the subjects of astronomy, ecclesiastical computus (calculation of the date of Easter), astrology, medicine, Roman civil law, and Greek rhetoric and philosophy.
At some time before the 660s, Theodore had travelled west to Rome, where he lived with a community of Eastern monks, probably at the monastery of St. Anastasius. At this time, in addition to his already profound Greek intellectual inheritance, he became learned in Latin literature, both sacred and secular. In 664 AD, The Synod of Whitby confirmed the decision in the Anglo-Saxon Church to follow Rome. In 667 AD, when Theodore was 66, the see of Canterbury happened to fall vacant. Wighard, the man chosen to fill the post, unexpectedly died. Wighard had been sent to Pope Vitalian by Ecgberht, king of Kent, and Oswy, king of Northumbria, for consecration as archbishop. Following Wighard's death, Theodore was chosen by Vitalian upon the recommendation of Hadrian (later abbot of St. Peter's, Canterbury). Theodore was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury in Rome on 26 March 668 AD, and sent to England with Hadrian, arriving on 27 May 669 AD.
Archbishop of Canterbury
Theodore conducted a survey of the English church, appointed various bishops to sees that had lain vacant for some time, and then called the Synod of Hertford IN 673 AD to institute reforms concerning the proper calculation of Easter, episcopal authority, itinerant monks, the regular convening of subsequent synods, marriage and prohibitions of consanguinity, and other matters. He also proposed dividing the large diocese of Northumbria into smaller sections, a policy which brought him into conflict with Wilfrid, who had become Bishop of York in 664 AD. Theodore deposed and expelled Wilfrid in 678 AD, dividing his dioceses in the aftermath. The conflict with Wilfrid continued until its settlement in 686–687.
In 679 AD, Aelfwine, the brother of King Ecgfrith of Northumbria, died in battle against the Mercians. Theodore's intervention prevented the escalation of the war and resulted in peace between the two kingdoms, with King Æthelred of Mercia paying weregild compensation for Ælfwine's death.
Canterbury School
Theodore and Hadrian established a school in Canterbury, providing instruction in both Greek and Latin, resulting in a "golden age" of Anglo-Saxon scholarship:
“They attracted a large number of students, into whose minds they poured the waters of wholesome knowledge day by day. In addition to instructing them in the Holy Scriptures, they also taught their pupils poetry, astronomy, and the calculation of the church calendar...Never had there been such happy times as these since the English settled Britain.” - Bede
Theodore also taught sacred music, introduced various texts, knowledge of Eastern saints, and may even have been responsible for the introduction of the Litany of the Saints, a major liturgical innovation, into the West. Some of his thoughts are accessible in the Biblical Commentaries, notes compiled by his students at the Canterbury School. Of immense interest is the text, recently attributed to him, called Laterculus Malalianus. Overlooked for many years, it was rediscovered in the 1990s, and has since been shown to contain numerous interesting elements reflecting Theodore's trans-Mediterranean formation. A record of the teaching of Theodore and Adrian is preserved in the Leiden Glossary.
Pupils from the school at Canterbury were sent out as Benedictine abbots in southern England, disseminating the curriculum of Theodore. Theodore called other synods, in September 680 AD at Hatfield, Hertfordshire, confirming English orthodoxy in the Monothelite controversy, and circa 684 AD at Twyford, near Alnwick in Northumbria. Lastly, a penitential composed under his direction is still extant.
Theodore died in 690 AD at the age of 88, having held the archbishopric for twenty-two years. He was buried in Canterbury at the church known today as St. Augustine's Abbey; at the time of his death it was called St. Peter's church.
Almighty God, you called your servant Theodore of Tarsus from Rome to the see of Canterbury, and gave him gifts of grace and wisdom to establish unity where there had been division, and order where there had been chaos: Create in your Church, by the operation of the Holy Spirit, such godly union and concord that it may proclaim, both by word and example, the Gospel of the Prince of Peace; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Amen.
#christianity#saints#church#father troy beecham#troy beecham episcopal#father troy beecham episcopal
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do you know of an affirming church holding online services during the pandemic?
Ooh yes, let’s start a list y’all!
I will note that a lot of churches seem to be in the process of figuring out what to do in the coming weeks – so keep an eye on this post, I imagine I’ll have more links to share next week.
If you notice any errors in the stuff below, please let me know!
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Any live-streamed content (aka stuff you can watch / listen to as it’s being recorded) will have an *asterisk in front of it.
Online Services
Here’s my church in Louisville’s online service from last Sunday – it’s a video format that you go through at your own pace. I’m not sure if they plan on posting a new one each Sunday, but if so, they’d be posting those on their facebook page.
*Cornerstone Metropolitan Community Church in Mobile, Alabama, live-streams its worship services every Sunday 10:45am CST – video.
All Souls Church Unitarian in Washington DC is posting recorded services (music, scripture, sermon) every Sunday on their Facebook page – video format.
Mt Washington Presbyterian Church is posting recorded services every Friday on their Facebook page – video.
*Plymouth Congregational Church, UCC, in New York is live-streaming services every Sunday at 10am EST on their Facebook – video.
*Plymouth Congregational Church, UCC (a different one from the previous link), in Ohio is live-streaming services every Sunday at 10:30am EST on their Facebook – video. (based on photos they seem very vocally LGBT affirming btw)
*Highland Baptist Church in Louisville KY is live-streaming services on Fridays 7pm EST and Sundays 10am EST. video.
*St. Bart’s Episcopal Church in California is live-streaming services at 5pm Pacific time on Saturday and 10:15am Pacific time on Sunday. video.
*First Presbyterian Church in Kentucky is live-streaming services at 11am EST on Sunday. video.
*Village Presbyterian Church in Kansas is live-streaming services at 9:30am Central time on Sundays. video.
St. Luke’s UMC in Indiana is live-streaming services at 9:30am EST on Sunday. video.
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Online Bible studies and devotionals
*Rev. Emmy Kegler is a gay pastor who’s been posting morning prayer videos on her Facebook, on her Instagram, and on her Twitter – video format that you can watch live or after the fact.
*Austen Hartke’s new organization for transgender Christians (and their loved ones), the Transmission Ministry Collective, has been holding live “community prayer time” sessions on YouTube – video format.
My fully LGBTQA+affirming home church invites anyone to attend sermon planning each Tuesday at 1pm EST on Zoom, which is like an informal Bible study of whatever scripture passage will be preached on that coming Sunday. For more info, a zoom link, or a request for me to let you know about any other studies or online conversations at Grace, message me!
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For more worship content, you can also visit my #worship from home tag. Check out this masterpost of affirming churches’ archived sermons & services in particular – featuring audio, video, and transcript formats.
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Please add on if you know of an explicitly LGBTQ+ affirming church / faith community that’s posting online content during this pandemic!
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29 notable African Americans who helped change the world
From activists to entertainers to record-breaking athletes to a postal worker, 6abc shines a spotlight on the contributions of 29 influential African Americans in Philadelphia and beyond as we celebrate Black History Month.
Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander | Writer | 1898-1989
A native Philadelphian, Alexander was the first black woman to receive a Ph.D. in economics in the United States, the first black woman student to graduate with a law degree from Penn Law School, and the first African-American woman to practice law in Pennsylvania. Alexander's work and views are recorded in speeches kept in the Penn archives. The Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander University of Pennsylvania Partnership School ("Penn Alexander") in West Philly is named after her.
Richard Allen | Minister | 1760-1831
A minister, educator and writer, this Philadelphia native founded the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first independent black denomination in the United States. He opened the first AME church in Philly in 1794. Born into slavery, he bought his freedom in the 1780s and joined St. George's Church. Because of seating restrictions placed on blacks to be confined to the gallery, he left to form his own church. In 1787 he turned an old blacksmith shop into the first church for blacks in the United States.
Maya Angelou received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from former President Barack Obama in 2010.
Maya Angelou | Poet | 1928-2014
Angelou was an American poet, singer, memoirist, and civil rights activist with a colorful and troubling past highlighted in her most famous autobiography, "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings". She published seven autobiographies, three books of essays, several books of poetry, and is credited with a list of plays, movies and television shows spanning over 50 years. Her works have been considered a defense and celebration of black culture.
Arthur Ashe | Tennis Player | 1943-1993
Ashe's resume includes three Grand Slam titles and the title of the first black player selected to the United States Davis Cup team and the only black man ever to win the singles title at Wimbledon, the US Open, and the Australian Open. In July 1979, Ashe suffered a heart attack while holding a tennis clinic in New York. His high profile drew attention to his condition, specifically to the hereditary aspect of heart disease. In 1992, Ashe was diagnosed with HIV; he and his doctors believed he contracted the virus from blood transfusions he received during his second heart surgery. After Ashe went public with his illness, he founded the Arthur Ashe Foundation for the Defeat of AIDS, working to raise awareness about the disease and advocated teaching safe sex education. On June 20, 1993, Ashe was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bill Clinton.
James Baldwin | American novelist | 1924-1987
Baldwin was an American novelist, playwright and activist, most notably known for "Notes of a Native Son", "The Fire Next Time" and "The Devil Find's Work". One of his novels, If Beale Street Could Talk, was adapted into an Academy Award-winning dramatic film in 2018.
"It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have."
U.S. Deputy Marshals escort Ruby Bridges from William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans, La.
Ruby Bridges | Civil Rights Activist | 1954-present
At age 6, Bridges embarked on a historic walk to school as the first African American student to integrate the all-white William Frantz Elementary School in Louisiana. She ate lunch alone and sometimes played with her teacher at recess, but she never missed a day of school that year. In 1999, she established The Ruby Bridges Foundation to promote tolerance and create change through education. In 2000, she was made an honorary deputy marshal in a ceremony in Washington, DC.
Kobe Bryant | NBA star, humanitarian| 1978-2020
Drafted right out of Lower Merion High School at the age of 17, Bryant won five titles as one of the marquee players in the Los Angeles Lakers franchise. He was a member of the gold medal-winning U.S. men's basketball teams at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and the 2012 London Olympic Games. In 2015 Bryant wrote the poem "Dear Basketball," which served as the basis for a short film of the same name he narrated. The work won an Academy Award for best animated short film. A vocal advocate for the homeless Bryant and his wife, Vanessa started the Kobe and Vanessa Bryant Family Foundation aimed to reduce the number of homeless in Los Angeles. Bryant, his daughter Gigi, and seven other passengers died in a helicopter crash in late January.
Kobe Bryant inspired a generation of basketball players worldwide with sublime skills and an unquenchable competitive fire.
Octavius V. Catto | Civil Rights Activist | 1839-1871
Known as one of the most influential civil rights' activists in Philadelphia during the 19th century, Catto fought for the abolition of slavery and the implementation of civil rights for all. He was prominent in the actions that successfully desegregated Philadelphia's public trolleys and played a major role in the ratification of the 15th amendment, baring voter discrimination on the basis of race. Catto was only 32 when he was shot and killed outside of his home on South Street in1871, the first Election Day that African Americans were allowed to vote. In 2017, a monument to Catto was unveiled at Philadelphia's City Hall.
Philly unveils first statue dedicated to African-American. Vernon Odom reports during Action News at Noon on September 26, 2017.
Bessie Coleman | Civil Aviator | 1892-1926
Coleman was the first black woman to fly an airplane. When American flying schools denied her entrance due to her race, she taught herself French and moved to France, earning her license from Caudron Brother's School in just seven months. She specialized in stunt flying and performing aerial tricks. Reading stories of World War I pilots sparked her interest in aviation.
Claudette Colvin | Civil Rights Pioneer | 1939-present
Colvin was arrested at the age of 15 for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman, nine months before Rosa Parks' more famous protest. Because of her age, the NAACP chose not to use her case to challenge segregation laws. Despite a number of personal challenges, Colvin became one of the four plaintiffs in the Browder v. Gayle case. The decision in the 1956 case ruled that Montgomery's segregated bus system was unconstitutional.
Medgar Evers | Civil Rights Activist | 1925-1963
Evers was an American civil rights activist in Mississippi, the state's field secretary for the NAACP, and a World War II veteran serving in the United States Army. After graduating from college with a BA in business administration, he worked to overturn segregation at the University of Mississippi after Brown v. Board ruled public school segregation was unconstitutional. Evers was assassinated by a white supremacist in 1963, inspiring numerous civil rights protests which sprouted countless works of art, music and film. Because of his veteran status, he was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.
Mary Fields | Mail carrier |1832-1914
Known as "Stagecoach Mary", Fields was the first African-American to work for the U.S. postal service. Born a slave, she was freed when slavery was outlawed in 1865. At age 63, Fields was hired as a mail carrier because she was the fastest applicant to hitch a team of six horses. She never missed a day, and her reliability earned her the nickname "Stagecoach". If the snow was too deep for her horses, Fields delivered the mail on snowshoes, carrying the sacks on her shoulders.
Rudolph Fisher | Physician | 1897-1934
Fisher was an African-American physician, radiologist, novelist, short story writer, dramatist, musician, and orator. In addition to publishing scientific articles, he had a love of music. He played piano, wrote musical scores and toured with Paul Robeson, playing jazz. He wrote multiple short stories, two novels and contributed his articles to the NAACP all before his death at the age of 37.
James Forten | Abolitionist |1766-1842
Forten was an African-American abolitionist and wealthy businessman in Philadelphia. Born free in the city, he became a sailmaker after the American Revolutionary War. Following an apprenticeship, he became the foreman and bought the sail loft when his boss retired. Based on equipment he developed, he established a highly profitable business on the busy waterfront of the Delaware River, in what's now Penn's Landing. Having become well established, in his 40s Forten devoted both time and money to working for the national abolition of slavery and gaining civil rights for blacks. By the 1830s, his was one of the most powerful African-American voices in the city.
Robert Guillaume claimed the 1979 Emmy for Best Supporting Actor for his role in "Soap".
Robert Guillaume | Actor | 1927-2017
Robert was raised by his grandmother in the segregated south but moved to New York to escape racial injustice. There, he performed in theatre for 19 years, gaining momentum and a Tony nomination for his portrayal of Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls. In 1976, he landed his infamous role as Benson on Soap which won him an Emmy and his spin-off, Benson for which he won another Emmy. He returned to the stage in 1990, playing the role of the Phantom in Phantom of the Opera at the infamous Ahmanson Theatre. He voiced one of Disney's most beloved animated characters, Rafiki, and can still be heard as the narrator for the animated series, Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales For Every Child.
Francis Harper | poet | 1825-1911 (died in Philadelphia)
Born free in Baltimore, Harper was an abolitionist, suffragist, poet, teacher, public speaker, and writer. She helped slaves make their way along the Underground Railroad to Canada. In 1894, she co-founded the National Associated of Colored Women, an organization dedicated to highlighting extraordinary efforts and progress made by black women. She served as vice president.
Langston Hughes was instrumental figure in the Harlem Renaissance and jazz poetry.
Langston Hughes | Poet | 1902-1967
Hughes was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist. Born in Missouri, he moved to New York at an early age becoming one of the earliest innovators of a new art form, jazz poetry. In the early 1920's, his first book of poetry was published and he wrote an in-depth weekly column for The Chicago Defender, highlighting the civil rights movement. His ashes are interred beneath a floor medallion in the middle of the foyer in the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, the entrance to an auditorium named for him.
Zora Neale Hurston | American author | 1891-1960
Hurston became an American author, anthropologist, and filmmaker but as a child she was unable to attend school after her father stopped paying her school fees. In 1917 she opted to attend a public school but had to lie about her age in order to qualify for a free education. She studied hoodoo, the American version of voodoo, and found her way to Hollywood by working as a story consultant. One of her most notable works, Their Eyes Were Watching God was turned into a film in 2005.
Nipsey Hussle | Rapper, entrepreneur | 1985-2019
Born Ermias Joseph Asghedom, Hussle, was an American activist, entrepreneur, and Grammy Award winning rapper. Raised in South Central, he joined gangs to survive before eventually attaining success in the music industry. Hussle focused on "giving solutions and inspiration" to young black men like him, denouncing gun violence through his music, influence and community work, while speaking openly about his experiences with gang culture. Hussle was shot and killed a day before he was to meet with LAPD officials to address gang violence in South Los Angeles.
If you stop and look around near the intersection of Grand and Ellita Avenues, a brightly-colored mural of Grammy-nominated rapper Nipsey Hussle is sure to catch your eye.
Harriet Jacobs | Writer | 1813-1897
Born a slave, her mother died when she was 6. She moved in with her late mother's slave owner who taught her to sew and read. In 1842 she got a chance to escape to Philadelphia, aided by activists of the Philadelphia Vigilance Committee. She took it and worked as a nanny in New York. Her former owners hunted for her until her freedom was finally bought in 1852. She secretly began to write an autobiography which was published in the U.S. in 1860 and England in 1861. She lived the rest of her life as an abolitionist, dedicated to helping escaped slaves and eventually freedmen.
Cecil B. Moore | Lawyer |1915-1979
Moore was a Philadelphia lawyer and civil rights activist who led the fight to and successfully integrate Girard College. He served as a marine in WWII and after his honorary discharge, he moved to Philadelphia to study law at Temple University. He quickly earned a reputation as a no-nonsense lawyer who fought on behalf of his mostly poor, African-American clients concentrated in North Philadelphia. From 1963 to 1967, he served as president of the Philadelphia chapter of the NAACP and served on the Philadelphia City Council. Moore is cited as a pivotal figure in the fields of social justice and race relations. He has an entire neighborhood named after him in the North Philadelphia area.
Bayard Rustin | Civil Rights Activist | 1912-1987 (Born in West Chester, PA)
Bayard Rustin was an American leader in social movements for civil rights, socialism, nonviolence, and gay rights. He was a key adviser to Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s and was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2013. Rustin has local ties as he was born in West Chester and attended Cheney University of Pennsylvania, a historically black college. A gay man, he adopted his partner to protect their rights and legacy.
Nina Simone | Musician | 1933-2003
Born Eunice Waymon in Troy North Carolina, Simone was an American singer, songwriter, musician, arranger, and civil rights activist. Her music crossed all genres from classical, jazz, blues and folk to R&B, gospel, and pop. She learned to play the piano as a toddler and played in church where her father was a preacher. She would cross tracks to the white side of town to study classical piano with a German teacher and was later accepted into The Juilliard School. She went on to record more than 40 albums and in 2003 just days before her death, the Curtis Institute awarded her an honorary degree.
Big Mama Thornton | Singer | 1926-1984
Thornton is best known for her gutsy 1952 R&B recording of "Hound Dog," later covered by Elvis Presley, and her original song "Ball and Chain," made famous by Janis Joplin. Affectionately called "Big Mama" for both her size and her powerful voice, she grew up singing in church and eventually caught the ear of an Atlanta music promoter while cleaning and subbing for the regular singer at a saloon. An openly gay woman, she joined the Hot Harlem Revue and danced and sang her way through the southeastern United States. She played at the Cotton Club and the Apollo Theatre and continued performing sporadically into the late 70's.
Sojourner Truth | Abolitionist |1797-1883
Truth was born into slavery but escaped with her infant daughter to freedom in 1826. She then sued and won the return of her 5-year-old son who was illegally sold into slavery. In 1851, Truth began a lecture tour that included a women's rights conference where she delivered her famous "Ain't I a Woman?" speech, challenging prevailing notions of racial and gender inferiority and inequality. She collected thousands of signatures petitioning to provide former slaves with land.
Denmark Vesey | Carpenter | 1767-1822
Vesey was born a slave but won a lottery which allowed him to purchase his freedom. Unable to buy his wife and children their freedom, he became active in the church. In 1816, he became one of the founders of an independent African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church and recruited more 1,800 members to become the second largest "Bethel Circuit" church in the country after Mother Bethel in Philadelphia. In 1822, Vesey was alleged to be the leader of a planned slave revolt. He and five others were rapidly found guilty and executed.
Muddy Waters | Singer | 1913-1983
An American blues singer-songwriter and musician who is often lauded as the "father of modern Chicago blues", Waters grew up on a plantation in Mississippi and by the age of 17 was playing the guitar and the harmonica. In 1941, he moved to Chicago to become a fulltime musician, working in a factory by day and performing at night. In 1958, he toured in England, reviving the interest of Blues and introducing the sound of the electric slide guitar playing there. His performance at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1960 was recorded and released as his first live album, At Newport 1960. In 1972, he won his first Grammy Award for "They Call Me Muddy Waters", and another in 1975 for "The Muddy Waters Woodstock Album".
Phillis Wheatley| Poet |1753-1784
Born in West Africa and sold into slavery, she learned to read and write by the age of 9 and became the first African American woman to publish a book of poetry. In addition to having to prove she had indeed written the poetry, no one in America would publish her work. She was forced to go to England where the pieces were published in London in 1773. Years later, she sent one of her poems to George Washington who requested and received a meeting with her at his headquarters in Cambridge in 1776.
Serena Williams is arguably the greatest women's tennis player of all time, with 73 singles titles and an overall record of 831-142.
Serena Jameka Williams |Tennis Player |1981-present
Williams emerged straight outta the streets of Compton to become the world's No. 1 player. She has won 23 major singles titles, the most by any man or woman in the Open Era. The Women's Tennis Association ranked her world No. 1 in singles on eight separate occasions between 2002 and 2017. She has competed at three Olympics and won four gold medals.
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Time and Timelessness.
Discovering slowness.
20 years have passed since a memorable organ art project was started in the German City of Halberstadt in 2000. The performance of the organ piece “As SLow as Possible” by John Cage.
Some will remember Cage as the man who elevated silence – the musical - general pause to an art form. Cage showed himself to be a free spirit, a philosopher. He is also a painter and writer.
But let's start from the beginning.
In 1985 ASLSP was written in a version for piano. In 1987John Cage arranged the piece for organ at the suggestion of organist Gerd Zacher.
1997, 10 years later, at an organ symposium in Trossingen, the question arises as to the performance and how the tempo is to be understood. Organists, musicologists,organ builders, theologians and philosophers are involved. Of course - “As SLow as Possible” - can mean - infinite.
As long as there are people.
Our civilization.
Culture.
Technically, the answer is: As long as the organ exists.
This makes it clear: A room and an instrument are needed, that have a history and make history.
The world's first large organ comes into view, which was built in 1361 in the episcopal city of Halberstadt.The first with the now so familiar (12-key) keyboard.
1361! How long ago was that?
The chosen location is the Burchardikirche, one of theoldest churches in the city. Built around 1050. Partially destroyed in the 30 Years War. Rebuilt in 1711. In the time of Napoleon it got secular functions. Was a storage shed, distillery and pigsty.
A symbol for the everchanging times.
Now it is being restored. The Organ gets installed.
The performance is to begin in 2000. 639 years after the prestigious large organ was built. The end of the performance is planned for the year 2639. A special organ is built - protected from dust.
The instrument has its own emergency power generator. Just in case.
There are delays. The performance of the piece begins on September 5, 2001. Nobody would have noticed. Since it started with a break of one and a half years. The first organ note can be heard on February 5, 2003.
A year and a half later - the first real change of sound is a media event.
October 2013 was such a moment, too. Do we remember what happened seven years ago? In the world out there? In our places. In our lives?
Yes - some will get into philosophy there.
Given our ever changing modern times. What has happened since then?
The last change of sound took place seven years later:
On September 5, 2020. The next one will be on February 5, 2022.
If you want to be there - you should book early.2022.
What will the world look like then?
A mad world, that rotates faster and faster
We can't even say what will be in two months. So it makes sense - this project of the composer and his supporters. The ultimate deceleration, a very special "discovery of slowness".
A counterpart to the great buildings or monuments in human history - which have been planned and pursued and passed from generation togeneration. Despite all the changes of times, upheavals and crises. Perhaps it is a musical counterpart to the famous appletree, too.
The symbol of trust in God - the hope that – against all odds – there is a future for us.
A better World!
Time will tell...
September, 26, 2020.
For those of you, who want to listen...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYnEWbL6yao
#music#john cage#avantgarde#as slow as possible#composer#time#timeless#timelessness#deceleration#tempus fugit#organ#halberstadt#germany#experimental#power of music
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I was tagged by the delightful @indieninja92 to list ten niche interests of mine. I’m looking forward to seeing how wildly specific I can get.
1. Novels based on Jane Eyre. Jane Eyre wasn’t even the most formative nineteenth century novel I read in my high school years, but for some reason the moment someone says “oh it’s Jane Eyre but set in 2001 with a Korean-American protagonist” (Re Jane by Patricia Park) or “oh it’s Jane Eyre but with justifiable murder” (Jane Steele by Lyndsay Faye) I immediately go “give it here!” Rachel Hawkins has a modern take on it, The Wife Upstairs, coming out next year and I am stoked.
2. Queer romance novels. There are circles of the internet in which this interest is not niche at all, but I only have one or two non-internet friends who are it with me, so. You’re looking at someone who blocks of an entire day every time KJ Charles releases a new novel. Please come yell about them with me.
3. My local folk/folk-rock music scene. I am of course devastated about so many things right now, and one of them is that all my local ethnic summer festivals have been (rightly) canceled and I won’t be able to drink beer with my high school friends while staring at a kilt-wearing fiddle player who looks like a young ginger Kenneth Branagh.
4. Anglican choral music. I’ve been an Episcopalian my whole life, attended church at a cathedral since I was eleven, and sung in a cathedral choir since I was seventeen. At this point my spiritual love language is Anglican chant and anything set by Parry or Stanford. I miss evensong so much I could cry.
5. Shape-note singing! A choir friend who’s originally from Georgia introduced me to The Sacred Harp about three years ago (shape-note singing in the US is most popular in the south, particularly Georgia and Alabama, although Massachusetts also has a pretty going showing [Ben Wyatt voice: it’s about the Protestantism]). I have another friend who calls it group sight singing for fun, which is true. Even though the actual content of many of the hymns isn’t really my theology, people singing in a room together IS my theology.
6. YA novels based on Shakespeare. I feel like I have fairly thoroughly documented this interest on this blog.
7. Christian saints. Idk how much this counts as niche (growing up in an Anglo-Catholic Episcopal household and attending Catholic school has skewed my read on it) but I just think they’re neat! I like to read about my ancestors in faith and think about all the shit they had to go through and how that relates to all the shit I have to go through. There’s also a lot of art of them that really slaps.
8. Cross-stitching! I’m not good at working on projects steadily but when I pull them out I can sit for hours at a time stabbing cloth methodically to make something nice, which is therapeutic.
9. Memes about libraries, but only if they are made by librarians, and only if those librarians are progressive. A good progressive library meme is *chef’s kiss*.
10. Medieval sex history. I mean, medieval social history in general, but I took a class called Pre-Modern Romance in college (which could have been subtitled, “oh THAT’S where that unfortunate romantic trope comes from”) and I’ve never looked back. I particularly recommend the work of Dr. Eleanor Janega; she’s on Twitter which is great but her blog Going Medieval is exceptionally fun to read.
I’m not gonna tag anyone specific because there’s a lot going on and I don’t want anyone to feel obligated, but if you want to go off about your niche interests, feel free to do so and tag me so I see it! Yes, I do mean you!
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“I’ve played the piano since I was 3 years old and the harp since I was 11. I teach and I love music. I was in my early 20s when I started losing my hearing. When you’re a professional musician with a hearing loss, it’s a stigma. So I hid it for a long time, and I learned to read lips very well. Nobody knew until I couldn’t hide it anymore. I was at a concert about three years ago, and I broke a string. I had to replace it over intermission. I usually rely on an electronic tuner. But because there were so many people around me also tuning, I couldn’t hear well enough. I asked a violinist friend to help me hear to tune it. Then in rehearsals, I couldn’t hear our conductor. I began missing cues. I was completely lost. I had played with several community orchestras. But at this point I had gone back to school and didn’t have as much time. So I pared way down and just played gigs and with Baytown Symphony. Finally, I went to the conductor and said, ‘I can’t do this anymore because I’m deaf. I’m legally deaf. I love this orchestra, but you’d do better with somebody else.’ At first, there was a process of getting people to believe me. I hadn’t told anybody. I had hid it so well. Music is in a different range than speech. It’s still a range that I can hear. There are certain things on the harp that I can’t hear. But I can absolutely hear the piano. I still play weddings and stuff like that. It doesn’t affect that work because it’s just me playing. As long as I play the right notes, I’m good. But playing with an ensemble, I just can’t do. I’ve kept my piano students. But I had to stop teaching voice because I couldn’t hear my students. My hearing loss has been gradual over 20 years. I speak ASL and I read lips. So I live inside the deaf community as well, and I’m at peace with that. It’s helped shape the kind of ministry I’d like. I hope to become a priest with the deaf community for the Episcopal Diocese of Texas. We don’t have a deaf ministry, so I hope to bridge that gap. It’s God’s redirection for me. I can’t do everything that I used to do. But I still have vital things to offer the world. I feel like this is the way I can do that.”
— Amy Waltz-Reasonover
#baytown project#deaf#hard of hearing#sign language#lip reading#music#harp#piano#orchestra#religion#priest
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W. C. Handy
William Christopher Handy (November 16, 1873 – March 28, 1958) was a composer and musician who referred to himself as the Father of the Blues. Handy was one of the most influential songwriters in the United States. One of many musicians who played the distinctively American blues music, Handy did not create the blues genre but was the first to publish music in the blues form, thereby taking the blues from a regional music style (Delta blues) with a limited audience to a new level of popularity.
Handy was an educated musician who used elements of folk music in his compositions. He was scrupulous in documenting the sources of his works, which frequently combined stylistic influences from various performers.
Early life
Handy was born in Florence, Alabama, the son of Elizabeth Brewer and Charles Barnard Handy. His father was the pastor of a small church in Guntersville, a small town in northeast central Alabama. Handy wrote in his 1941 autobiography, Father of the Blues, that he was born in a log cabin built by his grandfather William Wise Handy, who became an African Methodist Episcopal minister after the Emancipation Proclamation. The log cabin of Handy's birth has been preserved near downtown Florence.
Handy's father believed that musical instruments were tools of the devil. Without his parents' permission, Handy bought his first guitar, which he had seen in a local shop window and secretly saved for by picking berries and nuts and making lye soap. Upon seeing the guitar, his father asked him, "What possessed you to bring a sinful thing like that into our Christian home?" and ordered him to "take it back where it came from", but he also arranged for his son to take organ lessons. The organ lessons did not last long, but Handy moved on to learn to play the cornet. He joined a local band as a teenager, but he kept this fact a secret from his parents. He purchased a cornet from a fellow band member and spent every free minute practicing it.
While growing up, he apprenticed in carpentry, shoemaking, and plastering. He was deeply religious. His musical style was influenced by the church music he sang and played in his youth and by the sounds of nature. He cited as inspiration the "whippoorwills, bats and hoot owls and their outlandish noises", Cypress Creek washing on the fringes of the woodland, and "the music of every songbird and all the symphonies of their unpremeditated art".
He worked on a "shovel brigade" at the McNabb furnace and described the music made by the workers as they beat shovels, altering the tone while thrusting and withdrawing the metal part against the iron buggies to pass the time while waiting for the overfilled furnace to digest its ore. He called the sound "better to us than the music of a martial drum corps, and our rhythms were far more complicated." He wrote, "Southern Negroes sang about everything...They accompany themselves on anything from which they can extract a musical sound or rhythmical effect." He would later reflect, "In this way, and from these materials, they set the mood for what we now call blues".
Career
In September 1892, Handy travelled to Birmingham, Alabama, to take a teaching exam. He passed it easily and gained a teaching job at the Teachers Agriculture and Mechanical College (the current-day Alabama A&M University) in Normal, then an independent community near Huntsville. Learning that it paid poorly, he quit the position and found employment at a pipe works plant in nearby Bessemer.
In his time off from his job, he organized a small string orchestra and taught musicians how to read music. He later organized the Lauzetta Quartet. When the group read about the upcoming World's Fair in Chicago, they decided to attend. To pay their way, they performed odd jobs along the way. They arrived in Chicago only to learn that the World's Fair had been postponed for a year. Next they headed to St. Louis, Missouri, but found no work.
After the quartet disbanded, Handy went to Evansville, Indiana. He played the cornet in the Chicago World's Fair in 1893. In Evansville, he joined a successful band that performed throughout neighboring cities and states. His musical endeavors were varied: he sang first tenor in a minstrel show, worked as a band director, choral director, cornetist, and trumpeter. At the age of 23, he became the bandmaster of Mahara's Colored Minstrels.
In a three-year tour they traveled to Chicago, throughout Texas and Oklahoma to Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida, and on to Cuba, Mexico and Canada. Handy was paid a salary of $6 per week. Returning from Cuba the band traveled north through Alabama, where they stopped to perform in Huntsville. Weary of life on the road, he and his wife, Elizabeth, stayed with relatives in his nearby hometown of Florence.
In 1896, while performing at a barbecue in Henderson, Kentucky, Handy met Elizabeth Price. They married on July 19, 1896. She gave birth to Lucille, the first of their six children, on June 29, 1900, after they had settled in Florence.
Around that time, William Hooper Councill, the president of what had become the Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical College for Negroes (the same college Handy had refused to teach at in 1892 due to low pay), hired Handy to teach music. He became a faculty member in September 1900 and taught through much of 1902. He was disheartened to discover that the college emphasized teaching European music considered to be "classical". He felt he was underpaid and could make more money touring with a minstrel group.
In 1902 Handy traveled throughout Mississippi, listening to various styles of popular black music. The state was mostly rural and music was part of the culture, especially in cotton plantations in the Mississippi Delta. Musicians usually played guitar or banjo or, to a much lesser extent, piano. Handy's remarkable memory enabled him to recall and transcribe the music he heard in his travels.
After a dispute with AAMC President Councill, Handy resigned his teaching position to return to the Mahara Minstrels and tour the Midwest and Pacific Northwest. In 1903 he became the director of a black band organized by the Knights of Pythias in Clarksdale, Mississippi. Handy and his family lived there for six years. In 1903, while waiting for a train in Tutwiler, in the Mississippi Delta, Handy had the following experience:
A lean loose-jointed Negro had commenced plunking a guitar beside me while I slept...As he played, he pressed a knife on the strings of the guitar in a manner popularized by Hawaiian guitarists who used steel bars...The singer repeated the line three times, accompanying himself on the guitar with the weirdest music I had ever heard.
About 1905, while playing a dance in Cleveland, Mississippi, Handy was given a note asking for "our native music". He played an old-time Southern melody but was asked if a local colored band could play a few numbers. Three young men with a battered guitar, mandolin, and a worn-out bass walked onto the stage. Research by Elliott Hurwitt for the Mississippi Blues Trail identified the leader of the band in Cleveland as Prince McCoy.
They struck up one of those over and over strains that seem to have no beginning and certainly no ending at all. The strumming attained a disturbing monotony, but on and on it went, a kind of stuff associated with [sugar] cane rows and levee camps. Thump-thump-thump went their feet on the floor. It was not really annoying or unpleasant. Perhaps "haunting" is the better word.
Handy noted square dancing by Mississippi blacks with "one of their own calling the figures, and crooning all of his calls in the key of G." He remembered this when deciding on the key of "Saint Louis Blues". "It was the memory of that old gent who called figures for the Kentucky breakdown—the one who everlastingly pitched his tones in the key of G and moaned the calls like a presiding elder preaching at a revival meeting. Ah, there was my key—I'd do the song in G. In describing "blind singers and footloose bards" around Clarksdale, Handy wrote, "surrounded by crowds of country folks, they would pour their hearts out in song...They earned their living by selling their own songs — "ballets," as they called them — and I'm ready to say in their behalf that seldom did their creations lack imagination.
In 1909 Handy and his band moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where they played in clubs on Beale Street. "The Memphis Blues" was a campaign song written for Edward Crump, a Democrat Memphis mayoral candidate in the 1909 election and political boss. The other candidates also employed Black musicians for their campaigns. Handy later rewrote the tune and changed its name from "Mr. Crump" to "Memphis Blues." The 1912 publication of the sheet music of "The Memphis Blues" introduced his style of 12-bar blues; it was credited as the inspiration for the foxtrot by Vernon and Irene Castle, a New York dance team. Handy sold the rights to the song for $100. By 1914, when he was 40, he had established his musical style, his popularity had greatly increased, and he was a prolific composer. Handy wrote about using folk songs:
The primitive southern Negro, as he sang, was sure to bear down on the third and seventh tone of the scale, slurring between major and minor. Whether in the cotton field of the Delta or on the Levee up St. Louis way, it was always the same. Till then, however, I had never heard this slur used by a more sophisticated Negro, or by any white man. I tried to convey this effect...by introducing flat thirds and sevenths (now called blue notes) into my song, although its prevailing key was major...and I carried this device into my melody as well...This was a distinct departure, but as it turned out, it touched the spot.
The three-line structure I employed in my lyric was suggested by a song I heard Phil Jones sing in Evansville ... While I took the three-line stanza as a model for my lyric, I found its repetition too monotonous...Consequently I adopted the style of making a statement, repeating the statement in the second line, and then telling in the third line why the statement was made.
Regarding the "three-chord basic harmonic structure" of the blues, Handy wrote that the "(tonic, subdominant, dominant seventh) was that already used by Negro roustabouts, honky-tonk piano players, wanderers and others of the underprivileged but undaunted class from Missouri to the Gulf, and had become a common medium through which any such individual might express his personal feeling in a sort of musical soliloquy." He noted, "In the folk blues the singer fills up occasional gaps with words like 'Oh, lawdy' or 'Oh, baby' and the like. This meant that in writing a melody to be sung in the blues manner one would have to provide gaps or waits."
Writing about the first time "Saint Louis Blues" was played, in 1914, Handy said,
The one-step and other dances had been done to the tempo of Memphis Blues. ... When St Louis Blues was written the tango was in vogue. I tricked the dancers by arranging a tango introduction, breaking abruptly into a low-down blues. My eyes swept the floor anxiously, then suddenly I saw lightning strike. The dancers seemed electrified. Something within them came suddenly to life. An instinct that wanted so much to live, to fling its arms to spread joy, took them by the heels.
His published musical works were groundbreaking because of his ethnicity. In 1912, he met Harry Pace at the Solvent Savings Bank in Memphis. Pace was the valedictorian of his graduating class at Atlanta University and a student of W. E. B. Du Bois. By the time of their meeting, Pace had already demonstrated a strong understanding of business. He earned his reputation by saving failing businesses. Handy liked him, and Pace later became the manager of Pace and Handy Sheet Music.
While in New York City, Handy wrote:
I was under the impression that these Negro musicians would jump at the chance to patronize one of their own publishers. They didn't...The Negro musicians simply played the hits of the day...They followed the parade. Many white bands and orchestra leaders, on the other hand, were on the alert for novelties. They were therefore the ones most ready to introduce our numbers. Negro vaudeville artists...wanted songs that would not conflict with white acts on the bill. The result was that these performers became our most effective pluggers.
In 1917, he and his publishing business moved to New York City, where he had offices in the Gaiety Theatre office building in Times Square. By the end of that year, his most successful songs had been published: "Memphis Blues", "Beale Street Blues", and "Saint Louis Blues". That year the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, a white New Orleans jazz ensemble, had recorded the first jazz record, introducing the style to a wide segment of the American public. Handy had little fondness for jazz, but bands dove into his repertoire with enthusiasm, making many of them jazz standards.
Handy encouraged performers such as Al Bernard, "a young white man" with a "soft Southern accent" who "could sing all my Blues". He sent Bernard to Thomas Edison to be recorded, which resulted in "an impressive series of successes for the young artist, successes in which we proudly shared." Handy also published "Shake Rattle and Roll" and "Saxophone Blues", both written by Bernard. "Two young white ladies from Selma, Alabama (Madelyn Sheppard and Annelu Burns) contributed the songs "Pickaninny Rose" and "O Saroo", with the music published by Handy's company. These numbers, plus our blues, gave us a reputation as publishers of Negro music."
Expecting to make only "another hundred or so" of "Yellow Dog Blues" (originally entitled "Yellow Dog Rag"), Handy signed a deal with the Victor company. The Joe Smith recording of this song in 1919 became the best-selling recording of Handy's music to date.
Handy tried to interest black women singers in his music but was unsuccessful. In 1920 Perry Bradford persuaded Mamie Smith to record two of his non-blues songs ("That Thing Called Love" and "You Can't Keep a Good Man Down") that were published by Handy and accompanied by a white band. When Bradford's "Crazy Blues" became a hit as recorded by Smith, black blues singers became popular. Handy's business began to decrease because of the competition.
In 1920 Pace amicably dissolved his partnership with Handy, with whom he also collaborated as lyricist. Pace formed Pace Phonograph Company and Black Swan Records and many of the employees went with him. Handy continued to operate the publishing company as a family-owned business. He published works of other black composers as well as his own, which included more than 150 sacred compositions and folk song arrangements and about 60 blues compositions. In the 1920s, he founded the Handy Record Company in New York City; while this label released no records, Handy organized recording sessions with it, and some of those recordings were eventually released on Paramount Records and Black Swan Records. So successful was "Saint Louis Blues" that in 1929 he and director Dudley Murphy collaborated on a RCA motion picture of the same name, which was to be shown before the main attraction. Handy suggested blues singer Bessie Smith for the starring role because the song had made her popular. The movie was filmed in June and was shown in movie houses throughout the United States from 1929 to 1932.
In 1926 Handy wrote Blues: An Anthology—Complete Words and Music of 53 Great Songs. It is an early attempt to record, analyze, and describe the blues as an integral part of the South and the history of the United States. To celebrate the publication of the book and to honor Handy, Small's Paradise in Harlem hosted a party, "Handy Night", on Tuesday October 5, which contained the best of jazz and blues selections provided by Adelaide Hall, Lottie Gee, Maude White, and Chic Collins.
In a 1938 radio episode of Ripley's Believe it or not! Handy was described as "the father of jazz as well as the blues." Fellow blues performer Jelly Roll Morton wrote an open letter to Downbeat magazine fuming that he had actually invented jazz.
After the publication of his autobiography, Handy published a book on African-American musicians, Unsung Americans Sung (1944). He wrote three other books: Blues: An Anthology: Complete Words and Music of 53 Great Songs, Book of Negro Spirituals, and Negro Authors and Composers of the United States. He lived on Strivers' Row in Harlem. He became blind after an accidental fall from a subway platform in 1943. After the death of his first wife, he remarried in 1954 when he was 80. His bride was his secretary, Irma Louise Logan, who he frequently said had become his eyes. In 1955, he suffered a stroke, after which he began to use a wheelchair. More than eight hundred attended his 84th birthday party at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.
On March 28, 1958, Handy died of bronchial pneumonia at Sydenham Hospital in New York City Over 25,000 people attended his funeral in Harlem's Abyssinian Baptist Church. Over 150,000 people gathered in the streets near the church to pay their respects. He was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.
Compositions
Handy's music does not always follow the classic 12-bar pattern, often having 8- or 16-bar bridges between 12-bar verses.
"Memphis Blues", written 1909, published 1912. Although usually subtitled "Boss Crump", it is a distinct song from Handy's campaign satire, "Boss Crump don't 'low no easy riders around here", which was based on the good-time song "Mamma Don't Allow It."
"Yellow Dog Blues" (1912), "Your easy rider's gone where the Southern cross the Yellow Dog." The reference is to the crossing at Moorhead, Mississippi, of the Southern Railway and the local Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad, called the Yellow Dog. By Handy's telling locals assigned the words "Yellow Dog" to the letters Y.D. (for Yazoo Delta) on the freight trains that they saw.
"Saint Louis Blues" (1914), "the jazzman's Hamlet."
"Loveless Love", based in part on the classic "Careless Love". Possibly the first song to complain of modern synthetics, "with milkless milk and silkless silk, we're growing used to soulless soul."
"Aunt Hagar's Blues", the biblical Hagar, handmaiden to Abraham and Sarah, was considered the "mother" of African Americans
"Beale Street Blues" (1916), written as a farewell to Beale Street of Memphis, which was named Beale Avenue until the song's popularity caused it to be changed
"Long Gone John (from Bowling Green)", about a famous bank robber
"Chantez-Les-Bas (Sing 'Em Low)", a tribute to the Creole culture of New Orleans
"Atlanta Blues", which includes the song "Make Me a Pallet on your Floor" as its chorus.
"Ole Miss Rag" (1917), a ragtime composition, recorded by Handy's Orchestra of Memphis
Awards and honors
On May 17, 1969, the United States Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp in his honor.
Handy was inducted in the National Academy of Popular Music Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970.
He was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1983.
He was inducted into the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame in 1985, and was a 1993 Inductee into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame, with the Lifework Award for Performing Achievement.
He received a Grammy Trustees Award for lifetime achievement in 1993.
Citing 2003 as "the centennial anniversary of when W.C. Handy composed the first blues music" the United States Senate in 2002 passed a resolution declaring the year beginning February 1, 2003 as the "Year of the Blues".
Handy was honored with two markers on the Mississippi Blues Trail, the "Enlightenment of W.C. Handy" in Clarksdale, Mississippi and a marker at his birthplace in Florence, Alabama.
Blues Music Award was known as the W. C. Handy Award until the name change in 2006.
W. C. Handy Music Festival is held annually in Florence, Alabama.
In 2017, his autobiography Father of the Blues was inducted in to the Blues Hall of Fame in the category of Classics of Blues Literature.
Discography
Handy's Orchestra of Memphis
The Old Town Pump/Sweet Child Introducing Pallet on the Floor (Columbia #2417) (1917)
A Bunch of Blues/Moonlight Blues (Columbia #2418) (1917)
Livery Stable Blues/That Jazz Dance Everyone Is Crazy About (Columbia #2419) (1917)
The Hooking Cow Blues/Ole Miss Rag (Columbia #2420) (1917)
The Snaky Blues/Fuzzy Wuzzy Rag (Columbia #2421) (1917)
Preparedness Blues (Columbia) (unreleased) (recorded 9/21/1917)
The Coburn Blues (Columbia) (unreleased) (recorded 9/24/1917)
Those Draftin' Blues (Columbia) (unreleased) (recorded 9/24/1917)
The Storybook Ball (Columbia) (unreleased) (recorded 9/25/1917)
Sweet Cookie Mine (Columbia) (unreleased) (recorded 9/25/1917)
Handy's Memphis Blues Band
Beale Street Blues/Joe Turner Blues (Lyric #4211) (9/1919) (never released)
Hesitating Blues/Yellow Dog Blues (Lyric #4212) (9/1919) (never released)
Early Every Morn/Loveless Love (Paramount #12011) (1922)
St. Louis Blues/Yellow Dog Blues (Paramount #20098) (1922)
St. Louis Blues/Beale Street Blues (Banner #1036) (1922)
She's No Mean Job/Muscle Shoals Blues (Banner #1053) (1922)
She's A Mean Job/Muscle Shoals Blues (Puritan #11112) (1922)
Muscle Shoals Blues/She's a Mean Job (Regal #9313) (1922)
St. Louis Blues/Yellow Dog Blues (Black Swan #2053) (1922)
Muscle Shoals Blues/She's a Mean Job (Black Swan #2054) (1922)
Handy’s Orchestra
Yellow Dog Blues/St. Louis Blues (Puritan #11098) (1922)
Louisville Blues/Aunt Hagar's Blues (Okeh #8046) (1923)
Panama/Down Hearted Blues (Okeh #8059) (1923)
Mama's Got the Blues/My Pillow and Me (Okeh #8066) (1923)
Gulf Coast Blues/Farewell Blues (Okeh #4880) (1923)
Sundown Blues/Florida Blues (Okeh #4886) (1923)
Darktown Reveille/Ole Miss Blues (Okeh #8110) (1923)
I Walked All the Way From East St. Louis (Library of Congress) (1938)
Your Clothes Look Lonesome Hanging on the Line (Library of Congress) (1938)
Got No More Home Than a Dog (Library of Congress) (1938)
Joe Turner (Library of Congress) (1938)
Careless Love (Library of Congress) (1938)
Getting' Up Holler (Library of Congress) (1938)
Oh De Kate's Up De River, Stackerlee's in de Ben (Library of Congress) (1938)
Roll On, Buddy (Library of Congress) (1938)
Olius Brown (Library of Congress) (1938)
Sounding the Lead on the Ohio River (Library of Congress) (1938)
Handy's Sacred Singers
Aframerican Hymn/Let's Cheer the Weary Traveler (Paramount #12719) (1929)
W. C. Handy's Orchestra
Loveless Love/Way Down South Where the Blues Begin (Varsity #8162) (1939)
St. Louis Blues/Beale Street Blues (Varsity #8163) (1939)
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Thoughts on praying. (Well, actually; on a lot of subjects, that’s just one of them, lol)
(behind a readmore for ppl who’d prefer to skip this kind of thing)
Praying is a weird thing, for me.
The fact is--I’m coming back to some kind of faith after...hm. Fourteen years of atheism? I missed religion and especially ritual, and would openly admit that in conversation if it came up. I was, in fact, a practicing Wiccan for a good year or two after realizing I didn’t believe in any kind of divinity anymore. I only left my coven after it became less important to me and I kept skipping rituals in favor of things like group bicycle rides (the drunken party kind, at night with loud music).
I started going to church again because I missed singing Christmas music. But I went to a “liturgical” church because I knew I wanted something ritual-heavy; old-fashioned in form but liberal in spirit. (An ELCA church would probably have been just as good; but I didn’t know about them--just that I couldn’t do a Catholic church and Episcopal was the closest thing I knew of that was affirming of LGBT people.)
And here I go bumping up against this again--this church fits me so well, the people in it are so good, the priest is fantastic; I keep finding out she’s friends with liberal Christian authors like Nadia Bolz-Weber and Rachel Held Evans--and it feels like fate. I mean, the first time I walked up to the building, I was greeted by a rainbow flag with parts of my fave Bible verse on it. (It’s on our nametags, too.) That might as well have been a flag saying “Hey April, this is the place for you.”
But do I believe in fate? Or destiny, or my life being guided by god? I don’t know. I still think the idea is hard to believe when so many people’s lives are shit through no fault of their own.
Anyway: prayer.
When I pray, who the fuck am I even talking to? I sometimes do feel like someone is listening. But so many people have prayed over the years and not felt like anyone heard them; so many people have poured out their hearts to god and gotten jack squat in response. It feels incredibly presumptuous to think Jesus is listening to me and not them.
But I do it anyway.
As I’ve mentioned, the Episcopal church is a liturgical one; they’re big on things like set prayer formats. The Book of Common Prayer (BCP, which I still sometimes misread as “birth control pills”), in some version or another, unites the entire Anglican Communion and is only changed very slowly over many years of arguing; some of the prayers in it have barely changed since the 1500′s. There’s a little wiggle room for each congregation, but step into any Episcopal church in the United States and the basic structure will be the same between them every Sunday: the readings from the lectionary, chanting a psalm, passing the peace, the Eucharist--there’s only a few versions of the Eucharist given in the BCP.
And I do like the set prayers. As I’ve mentioned, sometimes the collect for a given day feels really apropos. Sometimes the ones we do in church feel aimed directly at my own heart, and there I am feeling strangely exposed by words hundreds of thousands of people will be saying that same morning.
But I’ve also started, in my own uneven way, to do personal prayer. I’ve leaned heavily on Nicole Cliff’s essay called How I Pray that she wrote for The Toast (RIP), not long after her conversion. Her daily prayer comes down to (my own summation):
1. A rote prayer such as Our Father to separate this time from the rest of the day
2. Fearless moral inventory! What could I have done better? Where did I fuck up? (For Nicole this includes sometimes stopping prayer to go and apologize.)
3. Gratitude!
4. Ask for things I want
5. Pray for other people
And as Nicole points out, you don’t have to believe in anything at all for this kind of private reflection to be useful. Many books have been written about daily gratitude practice, for instance. She noted that taking the time to be grateful for her husband every day has improved her relationship with him, and that makes sense.
Nicole says her fave part, by far, is praying for other people; and honestly? That’s my fave thing as well. I did not expect that. And while I do keep a running list (in a private just-me discord server), frequently edited, of people I’m praying for on the regular so I don’t forget; I find myself doing it all the time at random during the day. I will see someone’s post on twitter talking about something hard in their life, and I’ll pray for them. A coworker will mention that they’re having trouble finding stable housing, and I’ll pray for them.
(To my eternal amusement--when I pray for people I know through fandom, I usually end up using their fandom name, not their real one; even if I know it! I figure God knows who I mean.)
They’re usually not eloquent prayers. Sometimes it’s more of a feeling than words--a weird fuzzy ball of compassion that grows and moves through me. Sometimes it feels like I’m a toddler tugging on God’s sleeve to get their attention and then wordlessly pointing at someone. Look, look! This person needs you.
And sometimes I find it difficult to pray to big-G God outside of the set prayers. Sometimes I can only do it if I’m praying to Mary. (Episcopal opinions on Mary devotion vary a great deal; from folks who pray the Rosary, to folks who think it’s Papist Bullshit.) Mary is easier. And she can pass things along. Praying to Jesus still feels intimidating to me sometimes, so I talk to his mom instead. I feel like I can be less formal with her.
I’m not going to claim this is making me an amazing person. But I do think that, whether or not anyone or anything is listening, taking a few seconds to pay attention and actively feel compassion towards other people is helping me be kinder. Sometimes. I just started, y’know, give me time.
#my life#anne lamott has a book (that I haven't read yet but it's on the list lol)#that says all prayer is some variation on three things: Help! Thanks! and Wow!#and tbh she's right
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Pentecost
♫ Music Notes
Pentecost is one of the great festivals of the church year, its importance coming only after Easter and Christmas. During the prelude we will hear Invention on Veni Creator, something of an improvisation on the 9th century plainsong tune Veni Creator Spiritus (found at H-504 in the Hymnal 1982). “Come Holy Ghost, our souls inspire” has a long and close association with services of ordination, being sung right at the point where the Bishop is about to lay hands on the ordinand (BCP p. 533). It has also been used in English coronation rites since the accession of Edward II in 1307. This setting is by Flor Peeters (1903-1986), the prolific Belgian composer, organist, and teacher. The version we are singing for our processional hymn, “Come Holy Ghost, our souls inspire” (H-503), was written to be sung in alternation between the bishop and congregation by John Henry Hopkins, Jr. It was first sung by his father at the consecration of a missionary bishop in 1865.
The second piece in today’s prelude, Komm, Gott schöpfer, Heiliger Geist (Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire) is taken from a German adaption of the Latin tune Veni Creator Spiritus. It appeared in 1524 with Luther’s translation of the Latin text. This setting is by Johann Pachelbel (1653-1706), one of the most important German composers in the generation before J. S. Bach. Most of his music was written for organ, and everyone knows his famous Canon in D. His style is described as having great sincerity and sweetness. As was common in his era, he served in both churches and the courts in Germany and Austria. His music was highly admired by Bach, and at one point he was Johann’s older brother’s music teacher. Interestingly, Pachelbel's name is commonly mis-pronounced in the USA. In Germany and the rest of Europe, the emphasis is on the second syllable (pac-HEL-bel), with the last syllable clipped to sound almost like the English word "bull." The postlude, Ricercar pro Tempore Festis Pentecostalibus, by the German Baroque composer Johann K. F. Fisher (1656-1746) is based on the same melody.
Our sequence hymn, “Come down, O Love divine,” H-516, is closely linked with our Gospel reading, and Jesus’ promise to send the Advocate, the Spirit of Truth, to abide with us forever. The original 15th c. Italian text, “Discendi, amor santo,” was by Bianco da Siena, and was translated in the 19th c. by Richard Littledale reflecting the idea that the time of the “Golden Age” of the faith was in the Middle Ages. A close comparison of the themes and images of this text can be found in the Charles Wesley hymn, “O thou who camest from above the fire celestial to impart, kindle a flame of sacred love upon the altar of my heart.” (H-704) The tune that is sung around the English-speaking world to H-516, Down Ampney, is one of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ true masterpieces. The tune name was given because the village of Down Ampney (near Gloucestershire) was where Vaughan Williams was born in the Vicarage where his father was priest. During WWII the local airfield saw a lot of action. The church has a stained glass window commemorating the planes that flew from the airfield for the Battle of Arnhem in 1944.
During Communion the choir will sing O Holy Spirit, Flowing Light, arranged by Mary Bringle from the music of Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179). Hildegard’s music has become very popular in recent years, even including arrangements heard on popular radio stations and the dance floor of the disco. She is one of the most interesting women in history: abbess, theologian, preacher, musician, poet, doctor and pharmacist. She is the first woman composer for whom we have her actual music. As a mystic and visionary her ecological and holistic spirituality speaks prophetically to our time.
As we celebrate Pentecost and the coming of the Spirit, reflect on these other words of Hildegard:
“A musical performance also softens hard hearts, leads in the humor of reconciliation, and summons the Holy Spirit.”
“So remember: just as the body of Jesus Christ was born by the Holy Spirit from the spotless Virgin Mary, so too the singing in the Church of God’s praise, which is an echo of the harmony of heaven, has its roots in that same Holy Spirit.”
“Underneath all the texts, all the sacred psalms and canticles, these watery varieties of sounds and silences, terrifying, mysterious, whirling and sometimes gestating and gentle must somehow be felt in the pulse, ebb, and flow of the music that sings in me. My new song must float like a feather on the breath of God.”
The Rev. Dr. David Kerr Park, Director of Music
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