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Throwback Thursday: “Le Chant De L’Oignon,” Anonymous French Person

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The make-up, organizational structure, and even some of the names we employ in the U.S. Army derive from Napoleon’s Army.  So it’s always interesting to go back to Napoleon’s Army and learn something about how they did things.  Well.  One of the things they did was sing this song as they marched into battle.  I won’t rehash the history, which this video does an admirable job of telling, but I will say, I think this is just marvelous.  Screw the typical “I don’t know but I’ve been told” cadences that our soldiers run around post to.  I want them to sing The Onion Song.  I want Rangers to sing The Onion Song, I want Special Forces to sing The Onion Song, I want everyone to sing The Onion Song.  Getting them to sing it in French would be a bit of a stretch, and probably impolitic and a whole lot of other things, and, sure, it wouldn’t be the best tactical plan to sing this while, say, trying to locate and terminate Osama Bin Laden et al.  But the blood swooshes around the heart just a little bit quicker imagining our men and women in uniform singing this on parade, at the very least.

I’m spending the day at a phenomenally boring conference on an Army post.  I’ll be sure to bring it up to one of the Colonels there.  I’m sure it will be a big hit.  “Onion Song?  $%&^ing love the Onion Song!”  …Right.

Termagant Tuesday: “Rockhouse,” Ray Charles

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Making it happen.  That’s what we do here at the Tune-Up.  We make things happen.  We also use our powers of analysis, persuasion, and charm to convince others that no only do we know what’s up, but that others should follow our lead.  And, we drink cocktails on city rooftops.  Thought leaders, thing-happen-makers, cocktail-drinkers.  How very soignée.

Modernism Monday: “Learn Me Right,” Birdy, Feat. Mumford & Sons

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When in the course of a human’s events it becomes necessary to assess the path one is on, and one finds that one is in a bit of limbo, it can be a bit disheartening.  A wise woman once wrote that, really, you should take heart during stages like this.  “What is happening is that your old self no longer fits with who are you are becoming. What seems to be a state of limbo, is, in actuality, a spiritual journey, and it can only be navigated by surrendering into the ‘not knowing.’ It’s about learning to be ok with vulnerability, letting go of control, and trusting your interior guide.”

Who has two thumbs and is really super bad at this?  Me!  Hooray!  But who has two thumbs and tremendous friends who know me well enough to keep me together?  Also me.  Suddenly, limbo doesn’t seem so bad.

WALK-UP WEEK! Sacred Sunday: “I Need Jesus On My Journey,” James Cleveland and the Gospel All-Stars

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-l32MY29h3k

 

To equate using a thin wooden stick to hit a tiny ball traveling at 102 miles an hour with faith, one might very well need some sort of higher power’s help to hit a home run.  These three minutes of gospel awesomeness might do the trick.

WALK-UP WEEK! Throwback Thursday: “The Great Gate at Kiev,” Modest Mussorgsky

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You’ve been playing baseball since you were 20.  This is your last season before you retire; your knees and shoulder can’t take any more punishment.  Your team has finally made it into the World Series.  Tonight is the deciding game.  The bases are loaded.  You’re up.  You put on your helmet and walk to the plate.  This is your song.

Salubrious Saturday: “Twistin’ in the Wind,” David Byrne

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baQ8mOi1oIw

 

The first full week after being away from D.C. for almost two and the immediate wheels-down-at-DCA thought still remains.  It’s like a fusion of Plato’s Cave and the twist at the end of “The Sixth Sense:” I see tweaked-out, type-A, overachieving anxiety-balls.  I have a much better understanding of why people say that D.C. is a bubble.  I kind of knew that while I’ve been here for the past decade, but now it’s even more obvious.  I still love my “funny little town,” but dudes.  Seriously.  Chill.

Funk Friday: “Boomin’,” Slynk

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Today, for reasons not yet disclosable, I feel like a total badass.  Also, by a wonderful turn of serendipity, many good friends of mine are also feeling like total badasses – buying houses, getting selected for incredible jobs, sticking it to the man, etc.  We be boomin’.  Have a rad Friday, Tune-Up fans.

Throwback Thursday: “Piano Quintet No. 2 in C minor, Op. 115,” Gabriel Fauré

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Having sung the “Cantique de Jean Racine” approximately three hundred times, the first time as one of four-dozen high school students (oh how irreverently we belted out “Verrrrbegaaaaaaal ohhhhhh tray-ohhhhht,”*), I worked assertively to put quite a bit of distance between myself and Monsiuer Fauré.   I incorrectly assumed that the Cantique was all he had written, and had also conflated that piece’s unappealing pulverization with any other piece he might have written.

Mais, ça n’étais pas juste!  Exhibit A: his second piano quintet.  This piece was written in 1921, three years before Fauré’s death.  A music reviewer at its Paris premier wrote that, “We had expected a beautiful work, but not one as beautiful as this.”  Normally I abhor chamber music; its small size makes me feel both bored and claustrophobic, like I’m on a field trip to see a small town’s old, dusty geological museum.  But the emotional range of this piece is so expansive that it feels like standing on a rooftop.  It’s classical music, alright, but it’s also firmly modern.  To put this music in context, this was written about the same time as the irresistible “Doctor Jazz” (see last week’s Termagant Tuesday post), and they both have a playful attitude towards the regulations of melody, harmony, and rhythm that had confined music before.  The first bars of the first movement are so compelling, you just have to find out what happens next.  The third movement (14:54) is heartbreakingly lovely and delicate.  I’m sorry I ever doubted Fauré.

 

*A.k.a, “Verbe égal au Très-Haut.”