This Lincoln Center concert by the Villalobos Brothers will expand your preconceptions of “Mexican” music, mariachi it ain’t, even though they incorporate elements of it in their music.
So on this Halloween, on the eve of Día de los Muertos
Enjoy, Jack
PS, in the spirit of Día de los Muertos, the joyful remembrance of our dead. Mrs Jack , a collector of Masks, many from Mexico, would have loved the masks they are wearing as they open the concert.
jack, yes, those masks are magnificent, right down works of art, and the music aint bad either. thanks.
horsey’s halloween ‘toon:
The scariest man on Earth
Ghost House
Robert Frost – 1874-1963
I dwell in a lonely house I know
That vanished many a summer ago,
And left no trace but the cellar walls,
And a cellar in which the daylight falls
And the purple-stemmed wild raspberries grow.
O’er ruined fences the grape-vines shield
The woods come back to the mowing field;
The orchard tree has grown one copse
Of new wood and old where the woodpecker chops;
The footpath down to the well is healed.
I dwell with a strangely aching heart
In that vanished abode there far apart
On that disused and forgotten road
That has no dust-bath now for the toad.
Night comes; the black bats tumble and dart;
The whippoorwill is coming to shout
And hush and cluck and flutter about:
I hear him begin far enough away
Full many a time to say his say
Before he arrives to say it out.
It is under the small, dim, summer star.
I know not who these mute folk are
Who share the unlit place with me—
Those stones out under the low-limbed tree
Doubtless bear names that the mosses mar.
They are tireless folk, but slow and sad—
Though two, close-keeping, are lass and lad,—
With none among them that ever sings,
And yet, in view of how many things,
As sweet companions as might be had.
Jack
Excellent choice and a perfect one for today.
Pat
I had never read that particular Frost poem. It made me tear up a bit and brings to mind Lin-Manuel Miranda’s
Jack… wonderful music and wonderful masks! My parents collected them as well.
Leaving shortly… taking my iPad… see you there!
i liked how much fun they were having.
blueINdallassays:
October 30, 2021 at 9:48 pm
https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/29/weather/northern-southern-lights-us-europe-wx-scn/index.html
Some of you in the northern areas may get a Halloween treat.
“..,the Northern Lights could be visible from Portland Oregon to New York City. It may also be visible on the horizon as far south as Carson City, Nevada, Oklahoma City, and Raleigh, North Carolina.“
Great find! Love the masks, too. One song almost sounded Scottish or Irish to me.
Was hoping for a a new SNL with a play on “Meta” with a drunk Suckerberg/meatavitavegamin.
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/for-a-lesson-in-pre-k-excellence-look-to-alabama/
“Although there are states with much higher four-year-old enrollment, Steven Barnett, the co-director and founder of NIEER, said few have had the results Alabama has. In Florida, 72 percent of four-year-olds attended the state-funded preschool program in 2020, but the state spends less than half the amount Alabama does per student and only met two of NIEER’s benchmarks for success.”
“In Alabama, you could make the case that 40 percent of children have access to a program with long-term effects, Barnett said. “In many other states, you could make the case none.”
I hope universal pre-K doesn’t end up being government-run daycare. Look to Alabama?
Great stuff …….
Lot’s of news from “Old Mexico” lately .
MEXICO CITY, Oct 29 (Reuters) – A wooden canoe used by the ancient Maya and believed to be over 1,000 years old has turned up in southern Mexico, officials said on Friday, part of archeological work accompanying the construction of a major new tourist train.
https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/rare-ancient-maya-canoe-found-mexicos-yucatan-2021-10-30/
And really “Old Mexico” ……………
Archaeologists conducting excavations ahead of construction of a high-speed railway in southern Mexico have discovered thousands of pre-Hispanic structures, burial grounds and artifacts dated to as early as 700 B.C.E. The team, from Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), used laser scans and satellite imaging to survey the area, reports Radina Gigova for CNN.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/thousands-of-prehispanic-structures-found-along-mexicos-maya-train-route-180978946/
The permit was granted and when the workers came upon thousands of bones, the archaeologists INAH sent to monitor the renovation were quick to realize that they had found the Huey Tzompantli (Great Skull Rack) mentioned in the accounts of the Spanish conquistadores.
https://www.laprensalatina.com/mexican-scientists-seek-origins-of-1000s-sacrificed-by-aztecs/
I got into the story of the 4 Corners , and I’ve always suspected that the Aztecs were refugees from the huge drought that drove those peoples from that country.
The timelines match up , and we know that the people that built Mesa Verde’, and Chaco Canyon were trading deep into Mexico.
Macaw feathers and coco .
That drought was a real bear. Thousands of people lived North of Mesa Verde’ farming the Delores River Valley . There is a lot of evidence things got really violent as the place dried out.
The last half of the 13th century it slowly began to dry out, and then in 1276 it stopped raining for 30 years.
The Aztecs told of wondering for decades before they found the Valley of Mexico. Then Cortez showed up about 100 years later .
Music to see the 4 Corners by –
Mexico’s Ancient Inhabitants Moved Land and Bent Rivers to Build Teotihuacán
Architects of the Mesoamerican city transformed the landscape in ways that continue to impact modern development today, a new study finds
Nora McGreevy
Daily Correspondent
September 23, 2021
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/ancient-engineers-moved-land-and-bent-rivers-to-build-teotihuacan-180978735/
OM – those people did massive irrigation systems, which we are still finding and learning about. Most are quite elegant and useful to the land. Currently our irrigation systems are the old school US way of blasting until a hole is made, move to next and blast until a hole is . . . repeat until whole river systems are moved.
Folks, although we are looking at the Western areas of the U.S. and Mexico (drive a MAGA crazy by pointing out that Spanish is the European language of the West, Native American is primary) all Native Americans, both continents, were great engineers. Something little known in text books.
Something I have grown jealous of is my cat Boo’s tail. She has a wondrous tail, full and poofy. She can delicately wrap her tail over her head while curled up in her cat condo upper sleeping deck. she can cover her nose or her ears. Oh, I so often dream of our relatives which have their tails, they are our also our living cousins, and how they can so softly sweep their nice tails over their eyes to cut the sun glare to take a mid day nap. No thoughts of jumping around from branch to branch, no to have a most glorious tail to enjoy a nice nap with darkened eyes and muffled ears.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/31/politics/psaki-biden-covid/index.html
“Psaki said she last saw Biden Tuesday outside while masked, before the President departed for Rome for the Group of 20 Summit. Psaki said she was disclosing the positive test result “out of an abundance of transparency,” adding that she has experienced mild symptoms and is working remotely.“
Trump is up to his usual nastiness. He’s sending out fund raising letters with a T-Shirt for a contribution.
NEW THREAD