Wednesday, January 1, 2025

A00098 - P. S. A Time For Us: The Lyrics and the Voice of Johnny Mathis

 On late Saturday night, while scrolling through the channels to find something to watch, I came across a PBS special highlighting the music of Englebert Humperdinck and, by "coincidence", just as I joined the program this song was playing 



In my universe, there are no "coincidences". The timing of this encounter with a performance of "A Time For Us" immediately after having written about it, caused me to think that my previous post was incomplete.  While Henry Mancini's piano version is beautiful, the lyrics associated with later versions of the song has given even greater life to this masterpiece.  So, to complete what I started, I  now note the mastery of not only Engelbert Humperdinck and also of Andy Williams  


And I especially favor the rendition of the song as performed by Johnny Mathis. 

With these additions, and the references set forth below, I now believe that my job is done and that my post is complete.

Peace,

Everett "Skip" Jenkins
Fairfield, California
December 30, 2024 




A Time for Us

Song by

Johnny Mathis
A time for us, some day there'll be
When chains are torn by courage born of a love that's free
A time when dreams so long denied
Can flourish as we unveil the love we now must hide
A time for us, at last to see
A life worthwhile for you and me
And with our love, through tears and thorns
We will endure as we pass surely through every storm
A time for us, some day there'll be a new world
A world of shining hope for you and me
For you and me
And with our love, through tears and thorns
We will endure as we pass surely through every storm
A time for us, some day there'll be a new world
A world of shining hope for you and me
A world of shining hope for you and me
Songwriters: Nino Rota, Lawrence Kusik, Edward Snyder. For non-commercial use only.




----- Forwarded Message -----
From: skipjen2865@aol.com <skipjen2865@aol.com>
To: Everett Jenkins <skipjen2865@aol.com>
Sent: Saturday, December 28, 2024 at 02:52:06 AM PST
Subject: A Time For Us



In previous emails, I have noted that 1968 was the year the made me.  I will not repeat what I previously said but I will add that one of the reasons why it was an important year was because of the notion of romantic love that became embedded in my 14-15-year-old mind influenced by Franco Zeffirelli's beautiful film adaptation of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" and by Henry Mancini's haunting 1969 Love Theme based on Nino Rota's music from the movie.
 



Of course, the lovely Juliet in Zeffirelli's movie was Olivia Hussey, the British-Argentine actress who ten years later would again inspire me with her portrayal of Mary, the mother of Jesus, in Franco Zeffirelli's "Jesus of Nazareth." 


As is my custom, I finished watching "Jesus of Nazareth" early on Christmas morning.  And, as is also my custom, later on that Christmas day, I made a call to the woman who became my Juliet.  Now, some three days later, I learn of the passing of Olivia Hussey.  
 


Olivia Hussey's passing has caused me to pause and to reflect on those youthful days of 1968 and 1969, Those days are long gone now, but I will always be thankful for the memories of what it meant to have a Juliet and to be able to share a "Time for Us".
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A00097 - Songs That Always Make You Cry, Smile

 

Ellis,

In answer to your question, there was a song that came out in 1968 that became embedded in my mind because of my nascent athletic career.  In my only track and field campaign with Len Miller, I found that my running abilities were rather mediocre but I began to get some traction with my jumping abilities.  In February of 1969, I began to learn the Western roll method of high jumping.  For me, success came by learning to approach the bar with a certain cadence and the song that came out in 1968 provided the perfect cadence for my high jump approach.  The song was Soulful Strut by Young-Holt Unlimited


You can hear and feel the song at


I actually set my one and only athletic record by jumping to Soulful Strut.  I was 15, a sophomore on the Class C track team and, in May of 1969, I jumped 5'9 and 1/2" to set the school record.  Not bad for a 5'11" 110-pound Ethiopian refugee looking guy.  

Obviously, by the time my jumping career came to end in 1972 after my first year at Amherst College, my soul was embedded with the song Soulful Strut with the thousands of repetitions of the song I listened to during practice and competitions. 

Now, fast forward to this year, and I find myself in the uncomfortable position of being jolted every time a certain beer commercial comes on.


Like a Pavlovian dog, my natural response to this commercial is to jump out of my chair and jump over something.  But, Ellis, I am 71 now and jumping over anything is likely to land me on the floor with a major hamstring pull.

So, my friend, yes there are some songs which for better or worse will indeed cause a disturbance in body ... and the soul.

Peace,

Everett "Skip" Jenkins
Fairfield, California
December 28, 2024

----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Ellis 
Subject: Songs That Always Make You Cry, Smile

Everett's nostalgia made me think in a similar, but different vein:

My dear Friend/Sister Lisa Waddell told me a while ago that Bruce Hornsby's Mandolin Rain always makes her cry. I realized that I was (un)fortunate not to have a song that ALWAYS makes me cry. However, on the other side of that coin, the last part of Duke Ellington's Diminuendo in Blue and Crescendo in Blue, when Cat Anderson squeals on his trumpet, ALWAYS makes me smile.

Would you share which songs ALWAYS make you cry and which songs ALWAYS make you smile?

If you want to add a how and why is fine, but not required. I will not ask you to copy to your news feed or homepage nor to leave one word about where we met.

Let me know.

The Texas Pacifist


On Sat, Dec 28, 2024 at 5:10 AM, skipjen2865@aol.com
<skipjen2865@aol.com> wrote:

In previous emails, I have noted that 1968 was the year the made me.  I will not repeat what I previously said but I will add that one of the reasons why it was an important year was because of the notion of romantic love that became embedded in my 14-15-year-old mind influenced by Franco Zeffirelli's beautiful film adaptation of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" and by Henry Mancini's haunting 1969 Love Theme based on Nino Rota's music from the movie.
 



Of course, the lovely Juliet in Zeffirelli's movie was Olivia Hussey, the British-Argentine actress who ten years later would again inspire me with her portrayal of Mary, the mother of Jesus, in Franco Zeffirelli's "Jesus of Nazareth." 


As is my custom, I finished watching "Jesus of Nazareth" early on Christmas morning.  And, as is also my custom, later on that Christmas day, I made a call to the woman who became my Juliet.  Now, some three days later, I learn of the passing of Olivia Hussey.  
 


Olivia Hussey's passing has caused me to pause and to reflect on those youthful days of 1968 and 1969, Those days are long gone now, but I will always be thankful for the memories of what it meant to have a Juliet and to be able to share a "Time for Us".
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A00096 - A Time For Us

 In previous emails, I have noted that 1968 was the year the made me.  I will not repeat what I previously said but I will add that one of the reasons why it was an important year was because of the notion of romantic love that became embedded in my 14-15-year-old mind influenced by Franco Zeffirelli's beautiful film adaptation of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" and by Henry Mancini's haunting 1969 Love Theme based on Nino Rota's music from the movie.






Of course, the lovely Juliet in Zeffirelli's movie was Olivia Hussey, the British-Argentine actress who ten years later would again inspire me with her portrayal of Mary, the mother of Jesus, in Franco Zeffirelli's "Jesus of Nazareth." 


As is my custom, I finished watching "Jesus of Nazareth" early on Christmas morning.  And, as is also my custom, later on that Christmas day, I made a call to the woman who became my Juliet.  Now, some three days later, I learn of the passing of Olivia Hussey.  
 


Olivia Hussey's passing has caused me to pause and to reflect on those youthful days of 1968 and 1969, Those days are long gone now, but I will always be thankful for the memories of what it meant to have a Juliet and to be able to share a "Time for Us".


Peace,

Everett "Skip" Jenkins
Fairfield, California
December 26, 2024

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Tuesday, December 31, 2024

A00095 - Zakir Hussain, R. I. P.

 

 Learned today about the passing of Zakir Hussain, the Tabla Master (see below). 


Peace, 

Everett "Skip" Jenkins
Fairfield, California
December 17, 2024


----- Forwarded Message -----
From: skipjen2865@aol.com <skipjen2865@aol.com>
To: Everett Jenkins <skipjen2865@aol.com>
Sent: Tuesday, December 17, 2024 at 04:45:05 AM PST
Subject: Zakir Hussain, R. I. P.

Zakir Hussain, Tabla Virtuoso Who Fused Musical Traditions, Dies at 73

His collaborators included John McLaughlin, Béla Fleck, Ravi Shankar, Herbie Hancock, Yo-Yo Ma and members of the Grateful Dead.

Listen to this article · 7:12 min Learn more
Zakir Hussain wearing a traditional Indian shirt and playing the tabla drum. The sun is in the background.
Zakir Hussain at a festival in 2022, above; and below, with, from left, Shankar Mahadevan, V. Selvaganesh and Ganesh Rajagopalan. of Shakti, winners of the “Global Music Album” award for “This Moment.”

, pose in the press room at the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Peacock Theater on February 04, 2024 iCredit...Piyal Adhikary/EPA, via Shutterstock
Jon Pareles

By Jon Pareles

Published Dec. 15, 2024Updated Dec. 16, 2024

Zakir Hussain, a percussionist and composer who was both a master of North Indian classical music and a linchpin of far-reaching world-music fusions, died on Saturday in San Francisco. He was 73.

His death, in a hospital, was from the lung disease idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, his family said in a statement. He lived in the Bay Area.

Mr. Hussain earned the honorific Ustad, given to Muslim virtuosos of Hindustani (North Indian) classical music. He performed and recorded extensively with leading Indian musicians, including Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan and Shivkumar Sharma. His main instrument was the tabla, the tuned drums that accompany Indian classical ragas, but he also played many other traditional and modern instruments.

Mr. Hussain’s work reached well beyond the Indian classical tradition to forge global musical hybrids. With the English jazz guitarist John McLaughlin, the Indian violinist L. Shankar and the Indian percussionist T.H. Vinayakram, he formed the group Shakti in 1973. Shakti was not only an East-West fusion, but also, with its two percussionists, a fusion of North and South Indian rhythms.

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Mr. McLaughlin, Mr. Hussain and three other Indian musicians regrouped as Shakti to record the 2023 album “This Moment”; it won a Grammy Award this year for best global music album.

Mr. Hussain shared two more Grammys this year — for global music performance and contemporary instrumental album — for the album “As We Speak,” a collaboration by Mr. Hussain, the banjo player Béla Fleck, the bassist Edgar Meyer and the Indian bansuri (bamboo flute) player Rakesh Chaurasia.

Through the years, Mr. Hussain performed and recorded with George Harrison, Van Morrison, Yo-Yo Ma, Pharoah Sanders, the Japanese drum group Kodo, Herbie Hancock and Charles Lloyd.

He also composed soundtrack music and orchestral works, and until recently he played more than 150 concerts a year. To every performance, he brought an eagerly attentive presence, beaming as his hands flew over his tabla drums to deliver fleet, microscopically precise beats and melodic tones.

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At the ceremony where he accepted the 2022 Kyoto Prize, a Japanese lifetime achievement award in the arts and sciences, Mr. Hussain said: “I am from India representing the age-old tradition of North Indian classical music. The way it was played 500 years ago — same way it is being played now, performed now. The difference now is we not only are doing our music, Indian classical music, but we are also learning how to be able to talk our music in as many different musical languages as possible, because the world has become small.”

Zakir Hussain Qureshi was born on March 9, 1951, in Bombay (now Mumbai). He was the eldest son of Ravi Shankar’s longtime tabla drummer Alla Rakha Qureshi. His mother, Bavi Begum, oversaw the household while also taking care of her husband’s students. She changed his surname to Hussain a few days after he was born, on the advice of a saint, he said.

Mr. Hussain dated his musical career from two days after he was born.

“I was brought home from the hospital,” he told NPR in 2015. “The tradition is that the son is handed to the father, and then the father has to recite a prayer in his son’s ear, putting him on his way. My father, when he took me in his arm, instead of reciting a prayer, he sang rhythms in my ear. And my mother was very upset and said, ‘Why are you doing this?’ And he said, ‘Because this is my prayer.’”

After playing on drums, pots and pans as a young child, Mr. Hussain officially became his father’s student at 7. They would awaken daily before dawn to study Indian classical music for three hours. Before starting his school classes, Zakir recited the Quran at a madrasa and sang hymns at a Roman Catholic church. He lived near a mosque, where he would hear Sufi qawwali music.

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Credit...Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy

Mr. Hussain played his first paid concert when he was 12. He became a session musician performing Indian film music, which often fused an international assortment of styles. He made his United States debut at 18, playing with Ravi Shankar at the Fillmore East in New York in 1970, when his father was ill, and continuing with Shankar on tour.

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In San Francisco, he joined jam sessions with the Grateful Dead and recorded with band members on the 1971 solo album by the Dead’s drummer Mickey Hart, “Rolling Thunder.”

Mr. Hussain studied and taught ethnomusicology at the University of Washington in Seattle, where he earned a Ph.D. He moved to Northern California to teach at the Ali Akbar College of Music in San Rafael, where he led the Tal Vadya Rhythm Band, a cross-cultural, percussion-centered group.

Mr. Hart joined the group in 1975, and led by him and Mr. Hussain, it was renamed the Diga Rhythm Band. It released a debut album, “Diga,” in 1976, featuring the Dead’s Jerry Garcia as guest guitarist. One of its tracks, “Happiness Is Drumming,” was reworked into the Dead’s song “Fire on the Mountain.”

Mr. Hussain often joined Mr. Hart through the years, on projects including the 1991 album “Planet Drum,” which won the first Grammy Award for world music album. Global Drum Project — a group with Mr. Hussain, Mr. Hart, the Puerto Rican percussionist Giovanni Hidalgo and the Nigerian percussionist Sikiru Adepoju — also won a world-music Grammy, in 2009.

In 1978, Mr. Hussain married Antonia Minnecola, a dancer in the Indian classical style Kathak. She was also his manager. She survives him, along with their daughters, Isabella and Anisa Qureshi; two brothers, Taufiq and Fazal Qureshi; a sister, Khurshid Aulia; and a granddaughter.

Through the years, Mr. Hussain appeared on hundreds of albums, equally at home with Indian classical traditions and fresh multicultural hybrids. He recorded dazzling tabla duets with his father and extended, introspective ragas with leading Indian musicians. In 1991, he started a label, Moment Records, to release his classical and contemporary collaborations. Eight years later, the producer Bill Laswell and Mr. Hussain assembled Tabla Beat Science, a project that merged tabla drumming and electronics, leading to a studio album and a tour.

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Throughout his career, Mr. Hussain continued to forge kinetic musical alliances.

“Music is a conversation that happens amongst people,” he said in an interview with India Today. “And it happens to be a process or an exercise which transcends all borders and all fences, all religions, all other ways of life, and it’s a living process unto itself.

“If people all over the world would consider interacting with each other the way the musicians and the artists all over the world interact with each other,” he continued, “we would have a much more peaceful planet.”


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