From the Archives: 3-1-02
Volume 3, Issue 3
Inside This Issue: Get Off My Back About It! | Band Members Never Fail to Piss Me Off | Yay for Tour | 1812 Overture | I'm Writing a Book | 'Innuendos in Music' Series, Part 3 | Diary of a Narcoleptic | Sick and Wrong
Get Off My Back About It!
by Casey Lee PettittYou know, people? I'm kind of tired of people telling me that I haven't done an issue for a while. Do you think I don't know this? I'm the only one who writes for this pointless newsletter! Of course I know that I've missed two issues. But, of course, I have good excuses.
1. - I didn't do a January issue because I was having a nice Christmas break with my family and decided I would rather spend my time with them than write a stupid newsletter that no one reads.
2. - I didn't do a February issue because I forgot and then I just figured that no one would have read it anyway.
3. - Who actually reads it?
And finally...
4. - Nobody reads it, so if you want consistency, write some articles for me or send me letters or SOMETHING!!!
Band Members Never Fail to Piss Me Off
by Casey Lee PettittI suppose I should get my complaints out of the way right now. There are some people in band that are really pissing me off... Well... one in particular... then there's the percussion section... but I've talked about them enough...
There's this one dude in band, who... well, he just... AARRGGHH!!!!!!
Wind Ensemble is from 4pm to 5:30pm, okay? This guy, our string bass player who will remain nameless (because I don't know it), comes in late every day without fail. At 4:30 he comes strolling... no... strolling is too fast... maybe meandering is a better word... At 4:30 he comes meandering into the band room where he, then, takes about 20 minutes to get ready to play. 20 minutes!! Here the usual course of events:
He comes meandering into the band room... as if he thinks he's on time. He goes into the back room... which is really in the front of the room... to get his string bass and music. He comes back into the band room... again... as slow as he possibly can. He lays the bass on the floor and opens his folder. He pulls out all of his music just to find the three or four we're playing that day. If he isn't sure about what we're playing, he'll go to the back of the room and stare at the board like an idiot for a few minutes. Then he goes back to work on his folder. Once he finally has his music out an in order, he picks up his bass. But, oh no! He doesn't know where we are! Well, gosh. I'll bet if he came to class on time he'd know.
Once he's finally playing, if you watch him, he looks like he's trying to impress someone by the way he plays. Maybe he's trying to "get the funk on" (see "'Innuendos in Music' Series" article below). Well, let me tell you, I am impressed! (That last part was sarcastic... in case you didn't know...)
Yay for Tour
by Casey Lee PettittGosh, you know? I haven't been on a band trip in a long time. And this year we get to go on a band trip that's more different than any I've ever been on. We ride a bus through five different states (Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, and Idaho), we stay in peoples' houses, and we don't have to pay anything. In fact, they give us money for food and stuff. Man! That's so cool. We get to go to Reno and San Francisco and, geez... I just hope it's not lame.
It is lame in the fact that it's during Spring Break and that we have a concert every night from Saturday one week til Sunday of the next except for one night and we have to live with strangers each night and some of them might not be the most hospitable which kind of makes me wonder why they would let us stay there and... this is a pretty long sentence... so I just hope that all goes well during the week and we don't suck during the concerts.
1812 Overture
My Favorite Piece of Music and How It's Pissing Me Off
by Casey Lee PettittI'm sure everyone, including the musically inept, have heard or heard of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. Yeah, yeah... it's the loud song with the cannons in it. What a lot of people don't know is there is a chorus in the beginning and at the end of the piece. Many times when this song is played, it is arranged for just an orchestra or band. But if you find a good version of it, as I did many years ago, you can hear the choir sing in it.
John Briggs says in his book, The Collector's Tchaikovsky, of the 1812 Overture: "The overture depicts in music the turning-back and eventual rout of the Nepoleonic armies in 1812. The Russian landscape is depicted by means of Cossack and Nizhi-Novgorod folk songs. The French invaders are represented by a phrase from the 'Marseillaise': 'Allons, enfants de la patrie.' The 'Marseillaise' is heard in the minor, and finally is eclipsed by the Czarist National Anthem. Bells ring, cannon boom and the hymn, 'God Preserve Thy People,' peals forth in token of victory" (page 119).
The order in which the songs are sung are: "God, Preserve Thy People" (sung in Russian), "La Marseillaise" (sung in French), and at the end of the piece is "God Save the Tzar" (sung in Russian).
But where are the freaking words to those songs?!? All I've found so far is "La Marseillaise." I can't find any of the Russian ones!! Sheesh!! I suppose it would help if I could read Russian... I've probably found the songs several times and just haven't realized it.
Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture is probably my favorite classical work. Up there among Capriccio Espagnol (Rimsky-Korsakov) and Pictures at an Exhibition (Mussorgsky).
You may notice I enjoy the Russian composers...
I'm Writing a Book
But You'll Have to Wait Until It Comes Out to Read the Whole Thing
by Casey Lee PettittYeah, yeah. I am writing a book and so far I think it's really cool. Brooke (my good friend and fellow horn player) suggested I post the Prologue on this site. That's sort of a good idea. I could get input from people. But then there's copyright issues... mainly, I don't have a copyright on it yet... and I don't want to spoil the book for anyone.
I will say a little about the book though. It is a psychological thriller inspired by such Thomas Harris novels as Red Dragon, The Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal and also James Patterson novels like Along Came a Spider, Kiss the Girls, and the rest of the Alex Cross series.
FBI Special Agent Thomas Marks and his partner Special Agent Jill Delaney are on a nation-wide search for a serial murderer who calls himself "The Delivery Man." "The Delivery Man" kidnaps his victims, holds them for about a month, tortures them in unimaginable ways, and then kills them. But that's not where he stops. He then returns the body to where he found it with a note attached. All of the notes begin with, "Special Delivery to..." and addresses the note to the spouse of the murdered.
The working title for my book is What Goes Around, but that may change as the book develops. As of yet, I have only finished the Prologue and have started Chapter One. I only have a few characters figured out so far, such as Marks, Delaney, the Delivery Man (and his true identity), and a couple other minor characters. So I really need to finish creating characters before the book will really start to take off.
I'm really excited about it because all the ideas floating around in my head (I think) are really cool. Hopefully without giving too much away, I'll leave you with this quote:
"There is no mercy for the merciless." - The Delivery Man
'Innuendos in Music' Series, Part 3: Musical Terms and Symbols
by Casey Lee PettittI was hard-pressed to figure anything out for this installment of the "'Innuendos in Music' Series." But I finally figured something out... even if it's not a very good something...
Music is full of terms that most people don't know... mainly because most of the terms are Italian. Sometimes a style is indicated and is occasionally in English. An example of this would be "Funky." So am I to assume that I'm supposed to "get the funk on" while I'm playing my instrument? Hmm...
Other musical terms that have been brought to my attention are these:
Fingerings
Tonguing
Sticking
Lick
Blowing
G-string... Just to name a few...
Now onto the symbols. This was harder to come up with, so... use your imagination.
When two quarter notes are on the same beat and they are on the same note (ie, one tail with the note head on either side of the tail on the same note), what does that look like to you? You know, the long tail with the two ball shaped objects at the end?
Sometimes, for effect, a composer will crescendo and immediately decrescendo. Could this be the composer's way of describing intercourse? Starting calm, working up to a climax and settling back down to calm? I don't know... it was just a thought...
Has anyone noticed that in many pieces of music, measure 69 is a point of reference? You know what I'm talking about. Some measures have the number with a box around it just for a point of reference. Is it a coincidence that 69 is commonly a point of reference or is there something more?
Hmm...
Diary of a Narcoleptic
December, January, and February
by Casey Lee PettittNote from the Editor/Author: This is a fictional story that really has nothing to do with The Horn Gazette. The name of the diary is Elbow, a name from Shakespeare's Measure for Measure... and it's a funny name...
Dear Elbow,
......................................................huh?
Oh........................................................................................................................................
Sick and Wrong
Just See for Yourself
