Fascinating story about Don Patinkin. I'm always envious of people who knew and worked with famous people, be they economists, musicians, philosophers, or physicists. I enjoyed your music, too, and your wife's painting. I have a question, if you will indulge my curiosity. With your compositions, I know you are playing the piano; whence cometh the other instruments?
I've had quite a few such associations with the famous and accomplished. At some point, my son asked me, "Exactly who have you NOT had lunch with?" ... ... Glad you enjoy the music. All the instruments are on the piano. The sounds are exceptionally faithful to the physical instruments--which is why we splurged and bought this model 17 years ago. (I think it was $8,000 then which, given its usage and age, is not all that much.) It is, of course, just a laptop encased in a pretty piano shell, so I imagine the hard drive will die someday. I'm curious how far the technologies and sound quality have come since this model appeared.
If you go with a high quality keyboard for input, maybe $500, and then go with Apple Logic Pro for the DAW, maybe $200, I think you have amazing power to compose and produce music comparable to and perhaps even better than what you have been doing all these many years. I don't know if you are an Apple user. Using only a $200 MIDI keyboard and Garage Band, I am able to a concert grand piano with acoustics that sound like I'm playing in a large concert hall. I just haven't created the time yet to attempt multiple track compositions like you do. I'm still teaching full time at UVA Wise. I should just retire, I suppose, but the opportunity cost considering the whole deal is still too high. 😊
Apple iPad and iPhone, not laptop. I have Garage Band loaded in, but I've never figured out how to use it. Just need to sit down sometime, but I'm kind of impatient about learning new software. Both my Roland and my $800+ Yamaha have MIDI capabilities. But, again, I need to sit down and figure out how to use them.
Oh, forgot to say that you have fantastic talent using the other instruments. I've not tried such yet, but I'm kind of guessing it's not all that easy.
Thanks! And, not to brag, but it comes easily to me. Purely intuitive. I don't actually know how I do it. It just flows out of my mind and fingers without much thought.
The two most awesome associations I've ever had with the famous and accomplished, slight though they were, are lunch with James Buchanan, lunch with Theodore Schultz, and dinner with Buzz Aldrin. NCSU isn't Columbia, but in the world of agricultural economics and statistics, it isn't bad.
Wish I had met Buchanan. Never knew much about Schultz. I seem to know quite a few people who have had dinner with Buzz Aldrin; he must eat a lot. These days, I'll take NCSU over Columbia any day.
Yeh, I think ol' Buzz is a socializer for sure. My colleague and I were just sitting in a DC Italian restaurant and up he comes. Columbia seems to be having some issues, for sure.
I was devastated -- or as devastated as someone can be 5000 miles distant -- when I learned Notre Dame de Paris was on fire. I suspected nothing would survive the conflagration, but I was (happily) wrong. Then I read of the proposed alternatives following the fire, and I was disappointed to learn that the original edifice might be reconstructed in such a way that it would not be anything like the original, which I loved.
My last interaction with the cathedral was my most moving. I had stopped two days in Paris on my way from the US to Bangui, in the Central African Republic, where I was assigned several years. Anyone who worked very long in Africa knows the only way to reach that continent from the US after Pan Am ended its service from New York to Dar es Salaam was to fly through Paris or Brussels, and I was transiting Paris on my way back to my assignment.
Having finished my consultations in one day, I took the second day to walk around Paris. I was walking more or less aimlessly, but heading in the general direction on Notre Dame, and arrived there in early afternoon. This would have been in the late eighties.
Moving into the main part of the cathedral, I sat quietly near the back to rest and enjoy the ambience of the magnificent structure. After a while an organist began to practice for what I guessed was an upcoming religious service. The sounds of the organ in that huge structure were stunning and very emotional. I sat just living in the moment.
The organist was obviously practicing -- playing a portion of a larger composition, then repeating it until he or she felt it was correct.
The organ has always been a miraculous instrument for me. My grandmother and my father played it well, she having been a church organist for perhaps 50 years. We had one in our home since I was very young, and it made the move from Pennsylvania to California in 1949 and held a place of distinction in our new home there. Don't ask why I never learned to play. I just didn't, but I was partial to the instrument and when I started university studies at a school that offered a major in church organ, I used to sneak into the main building (the school had something like 12 organs, but the sounds of the one in the large hall was by far the best) to listen to students practicing. Pure magic.
And then there was the sound of that massive pipe organ in Notre Dame de Paris. More than magic -- transfixing.
Your first paragraph accords precisely with my thoughts in those early weeks. Some of the glass-topped discussions seemed to be aimed at making the cathedral into a secular monument to climate change activism and such (https://www.dezeen.com/2019/05/09/notre-dame-roof-vincent-callebaut-energy-food-farm/). Fortunately, saner heads prevailed, and it is once again a living, breathing religious institution. ... ... I traveled extensively in Africa, but never in Bangui. However, Bokassa was in his full glory during those years, and I imagine a visit to Notre-Dame to cleanse the soul would have been helpful after visiting his "empire." ... ... In New York City, I lived across the street from the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. By happenstance, I ended up as one of their house musicians, playing piano for their receptions in exchange for free tickets to their dazzling array of concerts, speakers, and other events. The Cathedral had a spectacular organ, and I, too, would sometimes just walk over and listen to rehearsals. Sometimes, I was the musician rehearsing in the sanctuary--on their astonishing Bosendorfer piano, with its 92 or 97 keys (I forget which model it was).
Nice, Professor. I actually visited Bangui for a couple of weeks while Bokassa was "emperor" and it was an empire. Then I was assigned back about 4 years later after the French had deposed him. The skeleton of his sumptuous throne still stood, stripped of its gems, under the seats of the national stadium. My house was on the banks of the river, about a mile upstream from the Hotel du Roc, where I stayed the first time I was there. I lived right beside a military camp. That should have been reassuring to me, but the second night after I moved into that house several guys from next door broke in while I was sleeping and stole everything they could. They took most of my clothes and all my shoes, so I had to go to work the next day in a bush suit and flip flops. I would end up wearing them the next two weeks until I could get some new clothes and shoes sent out from the US.
Bokassa flew back into the Bangui airport a year or two after I arrived for my longer tour and was detained at the airport. A good friend of mine was at the airport meeting the incoming flight and heard Bokassa protest in a loud voice when the chief of the presidential guard drove up to transport him into town. "Bokassa does not ride in a Land Rover" my friend heard him tell Col. Mantion, before being pushed into the colonel's Land Rover.
Bokassa had previously been tried in absentia, convicted, and sentenced to death. He was re-tried when he returned, found guilty, and sentenced once again to death. He lived in a small prison in the presidential palace, where Col. Mantion could watch him on closed circuit video. Then-president Kolingba allowed Bokassa to remain in that cell without ever carrying out the execution. Kolingba also kept Bokassa well supplied with food and scotch, and the former emperor died several years after I had left the country, I suspect of kidney failure.
One interesting note: a number of international journalists flew in for Bokassa's second trial, including a Newsweek correspondent (I have forgotten his name) who had been beaten severely by Bokassa several years previously. Bokassa saw him one day at the trial and said "no hard feelings, I hope?" A (sometimes) class act.
Great stories. A friend told me a story of one of his colleagues. EU, I think. He was meeting with Bokassa. One of his cabinet ministers walked in and interrupted to ask Bokassa a question. Bokassa got irritated with the conversation. He opened one of his desk drawers, took out a pistol, and shot the cabinet minister to death. Then he turned back to his guest and said, "I'm so sorry for the interruption. Now what were you saying?"
No Oxford comma. If we had had Google in 1980/81, I wouldn't have had much of a story to tell. Interestingly, in Patinkin's book, he has it here and there in all-caps with no commas at all. No recollection as to why.
“If you’re the only one who cares, he said, it’s easy to be the leading authority on the topic.” - So you’re saying I still have a chance at my advanced age?
Also, the photos of you two are classic. Society in general certainly dressed better back then, and both of you reminded me how far I stretched to buy that removable wool lining Burberry trench coat in the early 80’s. That was a big purchase for me. At least the Chicago winters provided plenty of suitable days for usage.
Your story about Professor Pantinkin was timeless and a great motivator. The cathedrals were always intended to be a response to the glory of God, so the standard of excellence was obviously high, just as the Temple of Solomon was in its day. The Cathedrals now stand as awesome examples of what can be accomplished by humans when we subordinate petty differences to a wonderful ideal. Sadly, the modern world has diluted the message, leaving many of these marvels without congregations to fill them.
Your comment about the relativity of age reminded me of an experience my daughter had in college.
She had been studying in Eisenach, Germany, as a grand completion of her senior year, and had the opportunity to witness an archaeological dig, I assume, near Wartburg Castle. The archaeologist found an old boot, which he gave her to hold. It amazed her that she was holding something that someone had worn over 500 years ago. It’s quite humbling.
A lovely recollection. Just yesterday, I read a story about a 9-year-old boy in England who found "an interesting stone" on the beach and kept it around the house for a while. When he was at a museum, he saw something similar and sent a photo to the museum's archaeological curator. The curator saw the header "Beach Find" and assumed it was just going to be a stone. When she opened the attachment, she found herself face-to-face with a Neanderthal hand axe from 40,000 to 60,000 years ago.
Was just in Paris, but alas, too soon to go into Notre Dame. Scaffolding was up all around the outside of it. Paris itself didn't seem like the Paris of old. The vibe was different. Maybe the reopening of Notre Dame can bring the old vibe back
“The original architects knew they would never see their creations finished. Like the sculptors Don Patinkin described to me long ago, the architects built for the Ages, not for themselves.” Maybe off-topic, but I am struck by how similar this insight is to one of the last paragraphs in Brideshead Revisited, and also to what is called the Romero Prayer. The motivation implied is not that of posterity, but of praising the deity. Surely true at least in part in the Middle Ages, but how true now?
And I went back to see if you used the Oxford comma, you did.
If I don't, it's because I made a mistake. :)
Fascinating story about Don Patinkin. I'm always envious of people who knew and worked with famous people, be they economists, musicians, philosophers, or physicists. I enjoyed your music, too, and your wife's painting. I have a question, if you will indulge my curiosity. With your compositions, I know you are playing the piano; whence cometh the other instruments?
I've had quite a few such associations with the famous and accomplished. At some point, my son asked me, "Exactly who have you NOT had lunch with?" ... ... Glad you enjoy the music. All the instruments are on the piano. The sounds are exceptionally faithful to the physical instruments--which is why we splurged and bought this model 17 years ago. (I think it was $8,000 then which, given its usage and age, is not all that much.) It is, of course, just a laptop encased in a pretty piano shell, so I imagine the hard drive will die someday. I'm curious how far the technologies and sound quality have come since this model appeared.
If you go with a high quality keyboard for input, maybe $500, and then go with Apple Logic Pro for the DAW, maybe $200, I think you have amazing power to compose and produce music comparable to and perhaps even better than what you have been doing all these many years. I don't know if you are an Apple user. Using only a $200 MIDI keyboard and Garage Band, I am able to a concert grand piano with acoustics that sound like I'm playing in a large concert hall. I just haven't created the time yet to attempt multiple track compositions like you do. I'm still teaching full time at UVA Wise. I should just retire, I suppose, but the opportunity cost considering the whole deal is still too high. 😊
Apple iPad and iPhone, not laptop. I have Garage Band loaded in, but I've never figured out how to use it. Just need to sit down sometime, but I'm kind of impatient about learning new software. Both my Roland and my $800+ Yamaha have MIDI capabilities. But, again, I need to sit down and figure out how to use them.
Yep. Learning curve challenge is definitely holding me back, too.
Oh, forgot to say that you have fantastic talent using the other instruments. I've not tried such yet, but I'm kind of guessing it's not all that easy.
Thanks! And, not to brag, but it comes easily to me. Purely intuitive. I don't actually know how I do it. It just flows out of my mind and fingers without much thought.
That's the way it is with true musicians. For keyboardists, it's "ear, eye, hand" coordination, I guess.
The two most awesome associations I've ever had with the famous and accomplished, slight though they were, are lunch with James Buchanan, lunch with Theodore Schultz, and dinner with Buzz Aldrin. NCSU isn't Columbia, but in the world of agricultural economics and statistics, it isn't bad.
Wish I had met Buchanan. Never knew much about Schultz. I seem to know quite a few people who have had dinner with Buzz Aldrin; he must eat a lot. These days, I'll take NCSU over Columbia any day.
Yeh, I think ol' Buzz is a socializer for sure. My colleague and I were just sitting in a DC Italian restaurant and up he comes. Columbia seems to be having some issues, for sure.
I was devastated -- or as devastated as someone can be 5000 miles distant -- when I learned Notre Dame de Paris was on fire. I suspected nothing would survive the conflagration, but I was (happily) wrong. Then I read of the proposed alternatives following the fire, and I was disappointed to learn that the original edifice might be reconstructed in such a way that it would not be anything like the original, which I loved.
My last interaction with the cathedral was my most moving. I had stopped two days in Paris on my way from the US to Bangui, in the Central African Republic, where I was assigned several years. Anyone who worked very long in Africa knows the only way to reach that continent from the US after Pan Am ended its service from New York to Dar es Salaam was to fly through Paris or Brussels, and I was transiting Paris on my way back to my assignment.
Having finished my consultations in one day, I took the second day to walk around Paris. I was walking more or less aimlessly, but heading in the general direction on Notre Dame, and arrived there in early afternoon. This would have been in the late eighties.
Moving into the main part of the cathedral, I sat quietly near the back to rest and enjoy the ambience of the magnificent structure. After a while an organist began to practice for what I guessed was an upcoming religious service. The sounds of the organ in that huge structure were stunning and very emotional. I sat just living in the moment.
The organist was obviously practicing -- playing a portion of a larger composition, then repeating it until he or she felt it was correct.
The organ has always been a miraculous instrument for me. My grandmother and my father played it well, she having been a church organist for perhaps 50 years. We had one in our home since I was very young, and it made the move from Pennsylvania to California in 1949 and held a place of distinction in our new home there. Don't ask why I never learned to play. I just didn't, but I was partial to the instrument and when I started university studies at a school that offered a major in church organ, I used to sneak into the main building (the school had something like 12 organs, but the sounds of the one in the large hall was by far the best) to listen to students practicing. Pure magic.
And then there was the sound of that massive pipe organ in Notre Dame de Paris. More than magic -- transfixing.
Your first paragraph accords precisely with my thoughts in those early weeks. Some of the glass-topped discussions seemed to be aimed at making the cathedral into a secular monument to climate change activism and such (https://www.dezeen.com/2019/05/09/notre-dame-roof-vincent-callebaut-energy-food-farm/). Fortunately, saner heads prevailed, and it is once again a living, breathing religious institution. ... ... I traveled extensively in Africa, but never in Bangui. However, Bokassa was in his full glory during those years, and I imagine a visit to Notre-Dame to cleanse the soul would have been helpful after visiting his "empire." ... ... In New York City, I lived across the street from the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. By happenstance, I ended up as one of their house musicians, playing piano for their receptions in exchange for free tickets to their dazzling array of concerts, speakers, and other events. The Cathedral had a spectacular organ, and I, too, would sometimes just walk over and listen to rehearsals. Sometimes, I was the musician rehearsing in the sanctuary--on their astonishing Bosendorfer piano, with its 92 or 97 keys (I forget which model it was).
Nice, Professor. I actually visited Bangui for a couple of weeks while Bokassa was "emperor" and it was an empire. Then I was assigned back about 4 years later after the French had deposed him. The skeleton of his sumptuous throne still stood, stripped of its gems, under the seats of the national stadium. My house was on the banks of the river, about a mile upstream from the Hotel du Roc, where I stayed the first time I was there. I lived right beside a military camp. That should have been reassuring to me, but the second night after I moved into that house several guys from next door broke in while I was sleeping and stole everything they could. They took most of my clothes and all my shoes, so I had to go to work the next day in a bush suit and flip flops. I would end up wearing them the next two weeks until I could get some new clothes and shoes sent out from the US.
Bokassa flew back into the Bangui airport a year or two after I arrived for my longer tour and was detained at the airport. A good friend of mine was at the airport meeting the incoming flight and heard Bokassa protest in a loud voice when the chief of the presidential guard drove up to transport him into town. "Bokassa does not ride in a Land Rover" my friend heard him tell Col. Mantion, before being pushed into the colonel's Land Rover.
Bokassa had previously been tried in absentia, convicted, and sentenced to death. He was re-tried when he returned, found guilty, and sentenced once again to death. He lived in a small prison in the presidential palace, where Col. Mantion could watch him on closed circuit video. Then-president Kolingba allowed Bokassa to remain in that cell without ever carrying out the execution. Kolingba also kept Bokassa well supplied with food and scotch, and the former emperor died several years after I had left the country, I suspect of kidney failure.
One interesting note: a number of international journalists flew in for Bokassa's second trial, including a Newsweek correspondent (I have forgotten his name) who had been beaten severely by Bokassa several years previously. Bokassa saw him one day at the trial and said "no hard feelings, I hope?" A (sometimes) class act.
Great stories. A friend told me a story of one of his colleagues. EU, I think. He was meeting with Bokassa. One of his cabinet ministers walked in and interrupted to ask Bokassa a question. Bokassa got irritated with the conversation. He opened one of his desk drawers, took out a pistol, and shot the cabinet minister to death. Then he turned back to his guest and said, "I'm so sorry for the interruption. Now what were you saying?"
With grateful thanks. Even the comments are splendid.... so so good. Thank you.
Mutual!
So what did the original printing reveal: comma or no comma?
I didn't remember! But two or three queries to Doctor Google brought this up:
https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=32015307673
No Oxford comma. If we had had Google in 1980/81, I wouldn't have had much of a story to tell. Interestingly, in Patinkin's book, he has it here and there in all-caps with no commas at all. No recollection as to why.
“If you’re the only one who cares, he said, it’s easy to be the leading authority on the topic.” - So you’re saying I still have a chance at my advanced age?
Also, the photos of you two are classic. Society in general certainly dressed better back then, and both of you reminded me how far I stretched to buy that removable wool lining Burberry trench coat in the early 80’s. That was a big purchase for me. At least the Chicago winters provided plenty of suitable days for usage.
Yup! Thanks for the compliments. We did love those trench coats!
Your story about Professor Pantinkin was timeless and a great motivator. The cathedrals were always intended to be a response to the glory of God, so the standard of excellence was obviously high, just as the Temple of Solomon was in its day. The Cathedrals now stand as awesome examples of what can be accomplished by humans when we subordinate petty differences to a wonderful ideal. Sadly, the modern world has diluted the message, leaving many of these marvels without congregations to fill them.
Yup. I don't know how much cathedraling gets done at Notre-Dame, either.
Your comment about the relativity of age reminded me of an experience my daughter had in college.
She had been studying in Eisenach, Germany, as a grand completion of her senior year, and had the opportunity to witness an archaeological dig, I assume, near Wartburg Castle. The archaeologist found an old boot, which he gave her to hold. It amazed her that she was holding something that someone had worn over 500 years ago. It’s quite humbling.
A lovely recollection. Just yesterday, I read a story about a 9-year-old boy in England who found "an interesting stone" on the beach and kept it around the house for a while. When he was at a museum, he saw something similar and sent a photo to the museum's archaeological curator. The curator saw the header "Beach Find" and assumed it was just going to be a stone. When she opened the attachment, she found herself face-to-face with a Neanderthal hand axe from 40,000 to 60,000 years ago.
Was just in Paris, but alas, too soon to go into Notre Dame. Scaffolding was up all around the outside of it. Paris itself didn't seem like the Paris of old. The vibe was different. Maybe the reopening of Notre Dame can bring the old vibe back
Let me know when you find out. :)
“The original architects knew they would never see their creations finished. Like the sculptors Don Patinkin described to me long ago, the architects built for the Ages, not for themselves.” Maybe off-topic, but I am struck by how similar this insight is to one of the last paragraphs in Brideshead Revisited, and also to what is called the Romero Prayer. The motivation implied is not that of posterity, but of praising the deity. Surely true at least in part in the Middle Ages, but how true now?
Great observations, great questions.
A lovely piece, Robert. Thank you!
And thank you!