Principal Wei's Weblog

I'm Popeye The Sailor Man

2012-01-23T10:17:00.008+08:00

(Listen to 'I'm Popeye the Sailor Man' by Billy Costello, the original voice of Popeye in animated cartoons)

Another recently purchased record for Chinese New Year!

Like many cartoons, such as Snoopy and Dennis the Menace, Popeye is a character originally created for a comic strip which is later adapted into an animated cartoon.

I can't remember if I've read any Popeye newspaper comic strips or individual comic books in my childhood, but I am sure I'v watched tonnes of Popeye animated cartoons on TV.

On TV Popeye always turned many hopeless situations around after gulping some spinach from a tin, which boosted his muscles and physical strength immediately. Therefore Popeye was taken as a healthy eating role model by parents to encourage vegetable-phobic (is there such a word?) children to eat more spinach.

I actually came to know this record through a radio programmed in an old newspaper circulated in Taiwan back in 1936. This record was once played over the air in Taiwan.

I was so amazed how producers at the then Taipei Radio Station (台北放送局, call sign JFAK) would collect and introduce music from the West, not only 'classical' works but also other popular tunes, to the audience in Taiwan. I then discover this record on eBay, bid and won.

Another DIY new year couplet for the year of the dragon

2012-01-22T17:04:00.006+08:00

Although I am definitely not good at Chinese calligraphy at all, again I write my own new year couplet (春聯 chunlian) with a Chinese writing brush, rather than buying a commercially mass-printed one.

As usual, my DIY couplet must have something to do with music and the academia and thus this year I compose a pair of lines which may be translated roughly as

"Joyfully play music and spread [it] throughout the globe (喜奏笙歌傳四宇);
Graciously welcome guests and converse over the history (高迎雅客論春秋)."

I have to admit that the handwriting gets even worse than the one I did last year. It looks indeed like homework or something at secondary school level.

However, I can't blame myself, as I do it only once a year. Thus, happy new year, the year of dragon. Have a happy and prosperous year.

New Year's Day before the New Year's Day of the Year of the Dragon

2012-01-01T01:19:00.000+08:00

(Click to enlarge and see how I have changed over the past few years, from 1st January 2007 to 2012)

The Chinese New Year of the Dragon falls on the 23rd of January in 2012. Before running towards a whole series of traditional rituals, I am obliged to herald the Gregorian New Year with thousands of revellers on streets.

For the sixth time in a row since the year end 2006, I went to the Taipei 101 fireworks show again last night, with my wife of course and, as I had spoken last year, my son, who is old enough now to join us.

While I am busy marking students' essays, striving to finish the manuscript of a paper which is scheduled to be published by the end of January, blah, blah, blah, I insist on maintaining the ritual of counting down to New Year at the same spot and then taking a photo thereafter.

I am so glad that Blogger is still in business and I am able to upload a set of comparative photos this year.

I Want Your Love

2011-11-12T16:45:00.007+08:00

(Listen to 'I Want Your Love' by Grace Chang released in 1957 Hong Kong on Pathé label)

Haven't purchased records from eBay for a while and thus haven't share with my readers great music transferred from 78 rpm records.

There you go—'I Want Your Love (我要你的愛)' by Grace Chang (or Ge Lan 葛蘭 known to most Chinese speakers ).

This is a 1957 Chinese cover version of Georgia Gibbs's 'I Want You To Be My Baby', which is indeed a 1955 cover as well of Louis Jordan's original recording made in 1953.

The instrumental arrangement of Grace Chang's version is quite similar to that in Georgia Gibbs's, and a huge part of the original English lyrics are kept to make this song a Mandarin/English combo. However, Grace not only articulates each English word with precision, but also creates her own interpretation, even with more of playful allure in a commanding tone.

Below are the English lyrics in Grace Chang's combo version. See if you can follow.

Listen to your mama and you never will regret it
And if anybody wonders you can tell them that I said it
The only thing I know is that I never can forget ya
I've been longin' for ya baby ever since the day I metcha
I gotcha where I want'cha and I'm never gonna let'cha
Get away from me

Hear what I tell ya
I'm the gal for you and so you'd better start to face it
If you ever lose my love you know you can't replace it
I think it's time for you to start to give me some lovin'
Carryin' a torch for you that's hotter than an oven
It's time for you to give me a little bit of lovin'
Baby, hold me tight and do what I tell you

I can, with my eye, but cannot with my tongue.

Enjoy Georgia Gibbs's to make a comparison with Grace Chang's.

A Rubik's Cube that never makes us frustrated

2011-10-29T19:59:00.006+08:00

Ever got frustrated with a Rubik's Cube? Now there is an alternative version that never lets us down.

From time to time I see news clips on TV showing how some people can
solve Rubik's Cubes in an amazing way. How can some nerds solve this mechanical puzzle in one minute, even solve it with their feet or while blindfolded?

These video clips always leave me totally flabbergasted, for I can't even solve this bloody puzzle with my eyes wide open in one hour.

Fortunately, there is a self-solving Rubik's Cube which requires no effort to solve. It has been solved in the beginning.

Well, actually it's a 3D logo of the Second Northern Taiwan Teaching Resource Centre.
The idea behind this logo comes from the well-field system, a and distribution method existing roughly between the 9th to 2nd century BC.

A square area of land was divided equally into nine sections, with the outer eight cultivated by eight individual peasant families and the centre jointly cultivated for the landowning aristocrat.

Whatever idea there is behind the design, the 3D version is absolutely great consolation for people like me who cannot solve a six-coloured cube.

Ronne drumming on his milk tin

2011-10-12T17:32:00.003+08:00

Fanne is running a promotion for her products, which invites parents to enter a competition by uploading videos of toddlers or young children dancing, rocking or taking any form of exercise to the official promotional song.

This promo song is a cover version of an advert tune from years ago with lyrics rewritten. I was requested to take on the task to produce a newly arranged backing track, coach the singer (actually a staff member of Fanne) and make the recording.

Fanne decided to let Ronne do whatever he liked in front of the milk tin, a sample of her products under promotion, and shoot a video as well. Crikey, nobody gave Ronne any instruction; he just started drumming on the milk tin.

However, his father, as a musicologist, couldn't figure out any rhythmic patter or relationship between his beating and the soundtrack.

What can you make with a handkerchief?

2011-10-11T15:33:00.009+08:00

Last Monday was the national day in Taiwan, which commemorate the Wuchang Uprising on 10 October 1911, which led to the collapse of the Qing Dynasty and the establishment of the Republic of China.

As this Chinese Republic nowadays has only its sovereignty over Taiwan and is not recognised as a country by the UN, it's alawys under debate whether Taiwan is still part of China and whether ROC still exists.

I don't bother to bother join the debate any more; those issues will be settled after I die, I strongly believe. Therefore, I celebrated this day with my son by playing a with handkerchief.

A cocoon.

Now a wrapped sweet.

Now a carrot.

And finally back to a handkerchief, and it can also become a cap.

Duck family for Ronne

2011-09-28T18:22:00.003+08:00

Haven't got interesting records recently worth writing a blog entry here, but bought some interesting toys (including the previous two: handbell set and magic mirror carousel) for my son.

Here comes another selection. I bought Ronne a big mother duck with three little lovely ducklings, produced by Ambi Toys, an Italian company. The three wee ones can hide inside their mother. The happy family can swim together to allow endless water play at bath time and can, of course, play out of water on the ground as well.

Certainly it's unnatrual— a duck is not a kangaroo and has no pouch. However, so what, I would ask. It's a creative design. It doesn't matter; kids will learn more about animals later at school.

Unlike the previous two I bought earlier this month which are reserved for Ronne's coming birthdays, the duck family were given to him immediately. He has had some good time with them for a couple of days.

Red Raven magic mirror movies

2011-09-21T14:02:00.000+08:00

Lucky boy! Dad bought Ronne another toy—well, not to be played with at the moment but to be reserved as another gift on your fourth birthday.

I bought an interesting item, Red Reven Magic Mirror, from eBay a couple of weeks ago. It's made in the late 1950s by Morgan Development Laboratories in New Canaan, Connecticut (a strange company which also made a multi-functional Lucite letter opener, which is plastic but extremely sharp and thus can be carried onto the plane without sounding the alarm at the security point).

This device is a modern version of the Zoetrope and its successor, the praxinoscope.

This 16-sided mirrored carousel is to be operated with special 'movie records', on which a 16 image cycle is printed on the outer two inches of a large paper label. Placed atop a 'movie record', the 16 mirrors are aligned at an angle to the surface of the record. When the record spins on the turntable of a record player, the quick succession of reflected static images produces a looped animation.

What's more surprising, that the animation comes with music, because a Red Raven movie record is really a vinyl music record. While the magic mirror brings out the animation, the music is delivered through the stylus on the phonograph.

Although once designed as a toy, Red Raven Magic Mirror is now a collectable item, a novel gadget. Lucky Ronne! Dad has prepared you another birthday gift and something to show you future classmates.

As I haven't got time to shoot a video about how it actually operates, refer to the YouTube clip to see how magic the Magic Mirror is.

Toy handbells for pleasure or campanology?

2011-09-21T11:52:00.006+08:00

Campanology (formed by Latin 'bell' campana and English suffix -ology) is a word which designate the knowledge and study of manufacturing, tuning and ringing bells. Somehow, I was told when I lived in Britain that campanology is a pretentious term to and thus loathed by serious bell-ringers, particularly those who consider ringing primarily a service to the church.

I don't expect my son to become a professional ringer or campanologist; he can decide later by himself. Nevertheless, I think it's good fun and musical exercise, especially in this day and age when most young children spend too much time on playing video game and surfing the internet, to play handbells so I bought a vintage toy handbell set made in 1954 from TimeWarp Vintage Toys (not very pleasant experience —they charged me 35 US dollars for postage while the actual cost was only 20) for my son.

There are eight plastic bells, each of which comes in a different colour with a real metal bell inside to produce different pitches, which encompass an octave . This toy set was approved by educators and endorsed by Ding Dong School, an daily educational TV programme produced for pre-school children in the 1950s. An illustration of a bell with DING DONG SCHOOL on it is placed at the right side of the outer box.

(Watch streaming video of several complete broadcasts on the contribute website of this old-time children's TV show to have an idea what sort of programme it is, if you fancy.)

As I suppose an 18-month-old toddler is obviously too young to ring bells in an organised manner to produce a 'tune' (don't ask me if a music prodigy, such as Mozart, can do it; I don't know either), I would reserve them as a gift for his second, or probably third, birthday.

A Mystery Record

2011-09-09T15:29:00.003+08:00

Side 1
Side 2
(Listen to the sides of this Mystery Record and see how many artists you can recognise)

The 2011 autumn semester is commencing. I shall write down something special to mark the arrival of the new semester from which my full-time job terminated. As life indeed has so many turns and is full of mysteries, I deem a 'Mystery Record', which I've just received yesterday, to be appropriate for this occasion.

Daily Mail, a British national daily tabloid established in 1896, once organised a 'voice recognising' competition in late 1932. In collaboration with EMI, which had just been formed in 1931 by the merger of two big companies–the Columbia Graphophone Company and the Gramophone Company–Daily Mail issued a 'Mystery Record'.

This record was actually a compilation of recordings released previously on labels of HMV, Columbia, Parlophone, Regal and Zonophone, all of which were then owned by EMI. Daily Mail offered a prize of 1,950 Pound Sterling for any reader who could correctly guess the identity of the more than two dozen artists on this record. The winner would be awarded in January 1933.

Under Agricultural Wages (Regulation) Act 1924, the average minimum wage paid to ordinary agricultural labours 51 basic hours (roughly weekly pay) in late 1932 is £1. 10s. 9d. Therefore, £1,950 is undoubtedly a big fortune.

Apart from the super-mega prize provided by the tabloid newspaper, what really amazes me is how the producer/engineer pieced together all the audio clips. There was no tape editing, no digital audio workstation, but how they managed to compile such a record?

I couldn't even name a single person on this record. How many can you?

Duck calling lesson on a gramophone record

2011-08-26T13:18:00.005+08:00

(Listen to the instruction on this interesting record and learn duck calling)

Gramophone machines and records used to be good aural aids in teaching and studying foreign languages before the introduction of cassette tapes, CDs or even digital formats. However, much to my surprise, though conceivable, 78 rpm records could also serve as a medium for learning bird language.

An interesting record I bought last week arrived yesterday. It's Duck Calling for Mallards and All Ducks of the Puddler Class, published by Philip S. Olt Company. (not in business anymore but restructured into P. S. Olt LLC now), a manufacturer of hard rubber game and bird calls from Pekin, Illinois.

It's a lesson, if I grasp the content correctly, which teaches you how to communicate with ducks, beguiled them to get within range of the rifle and then shoot them.

The lesson was given by Philip Olt, the eldest son of the founder of the original company. According to the company's website, Philip had made five instructional records to demonstrate duck calling, goose calling, diver duck calling, squirrel calling and crow calling.

Well, while we learn foreign languages to facilitate communication with people from distant lands, with good intentions I suppose, hunter study bird languages to coax them into termination.

Have you manage to speak some duck language after listening to the recording?

Chiense Version 'Polly Wolly Doodle'

2011-08-18T15:50:00.004+08:00

(Zhou Xuan at her late teens, image from this site)

Zhou Xuan (周璇), one of the greatest and most popular Chinese singer and actress in modern times, whose life accounts need not be reiterated here but can be read on Wiki, IMDb or many other websites through Google, once made a recording of 'Polly Wolly Doodle' with Chinese lyrics in 1935—'Roses blooming everywhere' (Qiangwei chuchu kai 薔薇處處開).

The Chinese lyrics were newly written and had nothing to do with the original lyrics published in 1880 nor the lyrics Shirley Temple sang in the 1935 film The Littlest Rebel.

Although there had been several recordings of 'Polly Wolly Doodle' made in and before the 1930s, such as Vernon Dalhart's 1929 version (Victor V-40132A), I believe Shirley's performance in the film would be an interesting one to be compared with the Chinese version.

While the Chinese singer-actress recorded 'Roses blooming everywhere' at her 17, Shirley starred in the film at 7 years old. I can't find a recording made by Shirley and don't even know if there was an original soundtrack ever released, but fortunately an enthusiastic YouTube user has made a video clip with the song against a photo.

Which version do you prefer, the late teenager Zhou Xuan's innocent voice in her 78 rpm single or the cherub Shirley Temple's naive interpretation in the film?

Somewhere At Sea

2011-08-10T17:35:00.003+08:00

Although this recording may sound like an ordinary piece by a 1930s British dance band, a typical jolly cheerful one, there is indeed something special.

The recording was made in London in May 1936 by the BBC Dance Orchestra directed by Henry Hall, with vocal by Dan Donovan. It is the official signature tune of RMS Queen Mary and Henry Hall is the director of the dance orchestra aboard this ocean liner.

Comparing to other ordinary Columbia records pressed in Britain, this one bears a special label designed to commemorate the ship's maiden voyage on 27th May 1936, sailing from Southampton to New York.

Queen Mary was retired from service in 1967 and is now a tourist attraction with restaurants, a museum and a hotel, mooring permanently at the port of Long Beach in California.

I have yet to convert the 78s record to the digital format. Therefore, watch the YouTube clip below to listen to a fantastically remixed version this piece while screening some images onboard.

As Time Goes By

2011-08-08T17:15:00.005+08:00

(Listen to 'As Time Goes By', a recording made more than ten years before Casablanca, reissued on Victor following the success of the film)

As time goes by, my postdoctoral contract has ended. I am now only an adjunct assistant professor, teaching part-time at two universities, and freelance composer and radio host, or broadly speaking, unemployed.

......

When I decided to write this weblog entry beginning with ‘as time goes by’, the melody of ‘As Time Goes By’ struck my mind. I came to know this song, just like most people I believe, through the all-time classic 1942 romantic drama film Casablanca, in which this song was sung by Sam, the singer-pianist who performed in the bar in the film played by Dooley Wilson, and the tune was used throughout the film as a leitmotif.

However, this song was not written particularly for the film but was a piece originally from the 1931 Broadway musical Everybody's Welcome. The song was recorded later in the same year by several singers after the debut of the musical, but didn't draw much public attention until it was employed in the film.

Interestingly, despite his hauntingly beautiful interpretation of this piece, the actor Dooley Wilson couldn't manage to make a recording for it because of session musicians' strike. As an alternative, the film company reissued a recording made by Rudy Vallée, one of the several who recorded the song in 1931 (Victor 22773), which made Rudy's version a massive No.1 hit in 1942.

Most people are familiar to the tune with the words

You must remember this
A kiss is still a kiss
A sigh is just a sigh
The fundamental things apply
As time goes by

Nevertheless, few people are aware that this is actually the chorus and there is a verse before it. As the verse was utterly left out in Sam's performance in the film, most people don't even know its existence.

Follow the lyrics below and enjoy the 1931 recording (reissued in 1942) by Rudy Vallée, with the verse which is normally omitted in all the cover versions recorded after 1942.

(Verse)
This day and age we're living in
Gives cause for apprehension
With speed and new invention
And things like fourth dimension.

Yet we get a trifle weary
With Mr. Einstein's theory.
So we must get down to earth at times
Relax relieve the tension.

And no matter what the progress
Or what may yet be proved
The simple facts of life are such
They cannot be removed.

(Chorus)
You must remember this
A kiss is just a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh.
The fundamental things apply
As time goes by.

And when two lovers woo
They still say, 'I love you.'
On that you can rely
No matter what the future brings
As time goes by.

Moonlight and love songs
Never out of date.
Hearts full of passion
Jealousy and hate.
Woman needs man
And man must have his mate
That no one can deny.

It's still the same old story
A fight for love and glory
A case of do or die.
The world will always welcome lovers
As time goes by.

Oh yes, the world will always welcome lovers
As time goes by.

A Bollywood cover of Paul Anka's 'Diana'

2011-07-20T14:11:00.004+08:00

(Listen to 'Hai ho dilruba meri neeta', the Indian version of 'Diana', from the 1959 Indian film Dil Deke Dekho)

There are always surprises in the world of gramophone records, particularly when one makes a purchase in a lucky-dip fashion.

I grabbed one more Indian film music record at a half-price sale on eBay, just because the label design caught my eyes. Actually, I happen to know that this romantic comedy Dil Deke Dekho was a smash hit in 1959 although I haven't watched it and hence have no idea how the music would sound like.

I was thrilled and absolutely amused to the core when I heard side A. Blimey, it's the Indian cover of Paul Anka's 1957 chart-buster 'Diana', the song which brought him instant stardom.

However, I'm a bit confused as well. Although the tune of 'Hai ho dilruba meri neeta' was definitely adapted from 'Diana', which had been written by Paul Anka himself less than two years ago, on the paper label of this Indian record, the composition was incredibly credited to an Indian music director Usha Khanna.

How could it happen?

Whereas Paul Anka's 1957 recording was released by ABC Records, a label owned by ABC-Paramount (the present-day American Broadcasting Company), this Indian film song was issued in 1959 on The Twin label, owned by the England-based Gramophone Co (EMI).

'Diana' has reportedly sold over 9 million copies, hitting No.1 on U.S. Billboard R&B Singles Chart and reaching No.1 on UK Singles Chart, but I wonder whether this song has ever reached the company building of EMI, whether any A&R staff member, factory technician, sales manager, or cleaning lady, whatever, in EMI had ever heard this UK No.1 hit.

How Usha Khanna was accredited with being the composer of the tune? I suppose ABC Records, as a company which was both physically and mentally too far from South Asia, had absolutely no interest in Hindi Cinema and therefore has never been aware of the situation to claim its copyright over this song.

Despite the historical trivia, I really got a kick out of listening to this Indian version 'Diana'.

A sonic watercolour of Brazilian scenery

2011-07-18T10:14:00.005+08:00

(Listen to the first recording of 'Aquarela do Brasil' performed by Francisco Alves to the accompaniment of Radamés Gnattali & His Orchestra, on Odeon, 1939)

'Aquarela do Brasil' ('watercolour of Brazil' in English) is probably the popular song that is representative of and associated with Brazil the most.

I have heard plenty of recordings of this all-time classic piece since my childhood, including Frank Sinatra's English cover, Antonio Carlos Jobim's bossa nova-ish interpretation, Geoff Muldaur's and Kate Bush's renditions in the 1985 black comedy filmBrazil, and, lastly my favourite fantastic a cappella version by Trio Esperança.

However, not until yesterday when I purchased this record had I come to know that 'Aquarela do Brasil' was first recorded in 1939, the same year it was written by Ary Barroso and some time after its unsuccessful first public performance in a musical.

Although once criticised as compliments to the dictatorship of Getúlio Vargas, probably because of its nationalistic lyrics, this song does show the songwriter's admiration for the beauty and musical culture of the country.

Refer to this page for the Portugese lyrics and English translation, and enjoy the 70-year-old recording.

Goodbye, Pepe

2011-07-07T18:45:00.005+08:00

In the end, I thoroughly understand why some people who treat their pets as close family members cannot deal with the shock and trauma of losing their beloved pets. Because I can't, either.

Our beloved Pepe (or 蓓蓓 Peipei in Mandarin) passed away peacefully in her bed at age of 18 years yesterday evening when I was working in the radio station. I couldn't manage to say goodbye to her as she took her last breath .

However, I managed to see her off. She was cremated at noon today.

Goodbye, Pepe. May you rest in peace.

Two exemplars of French songs

2011-06-27T14:50:00.005+08:00

(Listen to 'La Vie En Rose' by Édith Piaf from a 78s pressed in England in 1950, four years after its initial release in France in 1946.)

Excluding the so-called 'Western classical' works such as the famous habañera ‘L'amour est un oiseau rebelle’ from Georges Bizet’s opera Carmen or Gabriel Fauré’s famous choral piece ‘Cantique de Jean Racine’, I cannot name more than two French songs with full and correct titles. The only two are the national anthem ‘La Marseillaise’ and Édith Piaf’s signature song ‘La Vie En Rose’.

I've been asking students and friends to give me two French song titles that they are familiar with and so far these two have been the unanimous responses.

I came to know ‘La Marseillaise’ through the all-time classic black-and-white Casablanca on TV on a Sunday afternoon in my childhood, in the 1980s.

There was a scene in which the house band of a nightclub played the French national anthem with the crowd singing along in response to a group of German officers' German patriotic hymn. My father told me that was 'Masai qu' (馬賽曲 'the song of Marseille' in Mandarin).

I came across 'La Vie En Rose' much later. Although the tune is not obscure and, despite its ranking as an foreign oldie, never obsolete in Taiwan, I only learnt that the original singer is Édith Piaf during my undergraduate period in the mid 1990s.

I had for thousands of times heard but always dismissed the tune, whether sung by Piaf herself or played as an instrumental piece, until one day when I found myself bombarded with it relentlessly at a record shop for half an hour. Finally I enquired who was singing what. Hence, 'La Vie En Rose' became the second French song I have seriously known.

I've just won an auction for a 78s record of 'La Vie En Rose' but have yet to find out 'La Marseillaise'. For now, while enjoying the former with surface noise from the record, could you, dear readers, name two French songs for me?

MetLife's advert song from the 1920s

2011-06-24T16:41:00.004+08:00

(An advert song of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, with lyrics written by the vice-president, sung by the Peerless Quartet, c.1920s)

Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, or MetLife for short, is 'a leading global provider of insurance, annuities and employee benefit programs, serving 90 million customers in over 60 countries' as claimed on the official website.

I acquired a record some time ago, captioned with 'Persoanl Record Specially Made for The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company', on one side of which is 'The Metropolitan' sung by the Peerless Quartette.

This male quartet is regarded as the most commercially successful vocal group of the acoustic recording era, the time before the introduction of the microphone when musicians had to play into a giant cone.

As this group was inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003, it's not too difficult to find out some biographical information. However, I was really foiled when trying to explore when the record was issued, to what extent MetLife was involved in the production, as well as what the song is about.

I visited MetLife's official website and contact them at various email addresses, but was only dismissed. I suppose they might be interested in it for this song is part of MetLife's corporation history. The lyrics were written by Dr. Lee K Frankel, the vice-president of MetLife.

However, this leading global provider of insurance and blah, blah, blah didn't even have the courtesy to informed me that the enquiry had been received.

Well, fine, as I am not a client nor was I asking for a quote, I deserve it, but the song isn't bad at all.

'Zara' reads 'Thara', you lazy news presenters.

2011-06-18T16:27:00.007+08:00

(Image cited from The Internationalist)

Zara, a Spanish clothing brand owned by the Inditex group, has confirmed that it will start its first Taiwanese store in November 2011. Taiwan's first Zara will be located in Taipei 101 Mall.

Good news. As this Spanish high street brand offers a range of affordable and fashionable clothing for both men and women, and kids as well, Fanne and I are very much looking forward to its launch day.

However, I'm peeved off and fed up with the endless wrong pronunciataion made by those news presenters on TV. Zara is a Spanish brand and its initial consonant sounds 'TH' as in 'THink' rather than 'Z' as in 'Zero'. It reads THara ([ˈθaɾa] in IPA).

In my opinion, jounralists and presenters should make sure names of foreign origins are uttered correctly becuase they bear the responsibility to educate the general public. While a man on the street may read a foreign name wrongly, I don't think a news presenter is allowed to do so.

Can you news reporters or anchors do some homework before going on air? Would you think it's proper to prononce 'J' in the Spanish name José the same way you do in 'Joke'?

One more attempt at dance music with Ronne's voice

2011-06-11T17:36:00.004+08:00

(Listen to this new track I made, mixed with my son's voice )

The only thing I know to appreciate electronic dance music (EDM) is still nodding my head and shaking my body to the beat of head-bangking music. I suppose I manage to do it quite well. However, I would rather stay at home to undertake this head-torso-limbs-quaking activity than go to a night club where I have to shout and squeak when making conversations with others.

Having not made any bid on eBay for quite a while, I have no more antique sounds from 78s records to share with the readers of my weblog. Therefore, I had scarcely decided to make one more tentative dance track this afternoon when I found some audio clips in the laptop, recorded half a year ago when my son started learning to speak.

It took me the whole afternoon to input note by note to create the framework first and then to prepare midi files, to edit audio samplings and to mix down the track. It all paid off when I saw Ronne shaking his body to the pulsating beat of the track.

PS. The female voice at the beginning of the track is singing the catchphrase from 'The evening bell at Mt. Nangping' (南屏晚鐘 Nangping wanzhong), a Mandarin oldie I often sing to lull my son to sleep.

Cooked breakfast on a Sunday morning

2011-05-29T19:37:00.005+08:00

Tourists from the Continent or East Asian countries may complain that British cuisine lacks refined and heavenly specialities, but they have to admit that breakfast is absolutely an exception.

The full British breakfast features a range of cooked food such as bacon, sausages, eggs, mushrooms, baked beans, and fried tomatoes, to name a few. And the list may go on.

No wonder William Somerset Maugham, an English playwright and novelist active in the 1910s to 1930s, claimed English breakfast to be the best meal of the day and recommended serving it three times a day.

Believe it or not, I I used to prepare full cooked British breakfast form scratch for myself everyday, except those days when I had hangovers. Yes, for five years. Apart from those basic ingredients, especially the most important baked beans, I usually had one more extra dish—an omelette filled with cheese, mushrooms and finely chopped spring onions.

However, although I still cook breakfast after returning to Taiwan, I seldom have so much in the morning. Most of the time the only cooked bit is just a fried egg.

Today, waken up by the radiant sunshine and bloody chirruping birds at five on a Sunday morning, I decided to go to the food market at seven, much earlier than usual, and than have a quick, compact version of cook breakfast—grilled tomatoes, fried sausages, sautéed mushrooms and fried eggs, served with some toasted baguette slices.

Though not as extravagant as what I had when studying in Britain, it's really a surprise for my wife Fanne. It's not too bad to have a long lie-in and then wake up to a meal ready to eat on a Sunday morning, isn't it?

A tango at a tango bar

2011-05-15T17:07:00.004+08:00

(Listen to 'Por una cabeza' by Carlos Gardel from Tango Bar, 1935)

There are several definitions of the word bar to be used as a noun. Looking it up in a dictionary, you would probably find the first several to be 'a long rod or evenly shaped piece of solid substance', 'a regular narrow block of sold material' and 'a band of colour or light'.

One or two items further, there comes something like 'a counter or place across which beverages are served'. Right, that's where you intoxicate yourself and get tipsy, tight or, in the end, blotto.

However, there are some other types of bars where alcohol is not the main option. For example, whereas a juice bar serves prepared juice beverages, an oyster bar features fresh oysters, which are usually shucked on site within sight of the customers.

There is also a kind of bar which I've never come across so far—a tango bar. I can't imaging what else people can do in a tango bar besides tangoing.

Well, it's actually a Spanish-language film shot in 1935, with Carlos Gardel, the legendary tango singer-songwriter, playing the protagonist. It's where 'Por una cabeza', the second-most recognisable tango tune, after 'La Cumparsita', is from.

Tango Bar was acclaimed in newspapers as 'Un drama de pasion y aventuras, realzado por la música y canciones sin par' (something like 'A drama of passion and adventure, heightened by music and songs without the parallel', I suppose). It's definitely worth watching; I shall grab a DVD.

This 78s record arrived two weeks ago. Let's enjoy the original song delivered by Gardel himself, after having been bombarded with the instrumental versions in so many Hollywood films such as Scent of a Woman, True Lies and Schindler's List and so on.

For lyrics and English translation, please refer to The Tango Lyrics Page.

Fast-growing Ronne

2011-05-03T13:43:00.006+08:00

While women change their mind in a way more capriciously than we can imagine, just like a feather in the wind (not my personal opinion but based on 'La donna è mobile', a song from Verdi's opera Rigoletto), babies grow up at a speed much faster than we expect.

Well,today I'm not going to tell another story about another gramophone record. Thus, there is no audio player embedded, nor any old-time recording added.

I just want to share this photo with the dear readers of my weblog.

Roone will be 14 months old on the 5th of May, but at the moment he simply doesn't look like what a 14-month-old one should. One of the colleagues said he though this was a three-year-old boy.

It might be exaggeration, but Ronne does increase in size as well as change in appearance so fast that sometimes in the morning I would doubt if I took someone else's child home, when I had too much booze the night before.

Fortunately, it's always him, my good boy.

(2-day-old Ronne: what a difference!)

Mama... I want a boyfriend

2011-04-30T15:29:00.009+08:00

(Listen to the ‘Mama... yo quiero un novio’ by FUJISAWA Ranko, 1954)

In my opinion, the Japanese people are a very diligent and fussy people in the world. Once they start working on something that originates from another country, they work really hard so much so that they become the second best, if not the authority, in the world.

Listen to the audio clip. Would you observe that the singer is actually Japanese if I didn't tell you so?

I found this record on eBay when searching for some Carlos Gardel's tango records. The song title 'Mama... yo quiero un novio' (Mama... I want a boyfriend) caught my attention first. After I saw the fourth line on the paper label, I clicked the 'Buy It Now' button straightaway without any hesitation.

Wow, a Japanese vocalist's performance of tango produced by a Argentine record company! I just feel compulsory to own this record.

FUJISAWA Ranko (藤沢嵐子) is a Japanese singer who started her career at an American club in Tokyo after the War singing Western classical works, jazz tunes and Japanese popular songs.

Enchanted by 'La Cumparsita' played by an Argentine tango orchestra, she found Argentine tango the music she really wanted to sing and therefore turned to tangos from other genres.

In 1950, Fujisawa made her debut at the Ciro Club in Ginza with the Orquesta Típica Tokyo, conducted by her husband HATAKAWA Shinpei (早川真平). She then made her first recording in the ensuing year for Japanese Victor.

In 1953, she performed at a theatre in Buenos Aires, where the president Perón was among the audience. She was actually on holiday and only planned to stay there for a couple of days, but was requested to sing for the audience in Buenos Aires at a theatre by the director of a radio station, who had heard her on Japanese radio before.

The performance was so successful that several local radio stations strove to engage her to sing in the air. She finally stayed there for two more months.

Fujisawa performed again in Argentina in 1954 and for the third time in 1956.

Truly awesome. A Japanese singer conquered the Argentinians with Argentine tangos. If I didn't see the Japanese name on the paper label of the record, I would never know that the singer is actually Japanese-born Japanese.

(Portrait image from MySpace)

Clink, Clink, Another Drink

2011-04-16T18:14:00.003+08:00

(Listen to the ‘Clink, Clink, Another Drink’ by Spike Jones and His City Slickers, 1942)

The famous British comedian Spike Jones, together with His City Slickers, produced a drinking song titled ‘Clink, Clink, Another Drink’ in 1942, with a ‘soundie’, an early version of the music video to be played in a special film jukeboxe, which is now available on YouTube.

The record of ‘Clink, Clink, Another Drink’ I purchased from eBay arrived last week. It reminds me of the round drinking culture in Britain. Although it seems to be more efficient to buy a round, as only one from a group has to leave to get some drinks rather than all of the group members queuing up in front of the bar, it makes people consume more. For example, if five chaps buy you drinks, you absolutely have to buy a round for all of them to successfully organise a piss-up.

This is why it’s so common to see a person come in for a pint but end up having probably five. Therefore, I believe that, having lived in the UK for five years, British people out-drink their European counterparts. While toddlers in the Continent are given wine with meals as soon as they are weaned, as the rumour goes, British children grow up eager to emulate the round drinking habits of their elders.

At the very end of ‘Clink, Clink, Another Drink’, it goes ‘From now on I'll stick to milk/ Nothing else to drink for me.’ To me, it doesn’t imply going teetotal; it simply means there is no more wine/spirits/beer left. Pubs close at 11 o'clock in England and Wales, or 12 o'clock in Scotland, on weekdays, so the last round has to be ordered in time or otherwise nothing left to drink.

Enjoy this short hilarious piece.

Clink, clink, another drink
Plenty in the cellar when it's gone.
Drink, drink, the glasses clink
Making tinkly music till the dawn is breaking.

Clang, clang, who cares a dang?
What's the difference when you're on a spree?
Over the teeth, behind the gums,
Look out stomach here she comes
Hi! Have another drink on me.

Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle, gurgle.
Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle, gurgle.
Trinkle, trinkle, trinkle, trinkle.
Slice of cheese and bite of pickle
Doesn't even cost a nickel
Now to wash it down.

Clink, clink, no more to drink
I had a cellar full, but now it’s gone.
Drink, drink, the glasses clink
Like the anvil chorus and my head is splitting,
uh, brinking, uh, busting. Oh brother!

Oh, ow, what'll I do now
Pink elephants running after me.
Oh, that stuff is smooth as silk
From now on I'll stick to milk.
Nothing else to drink for me.

Birthday celebration with my son

2011-04-11T09:36:00.003+08:00

It's been the fourth year of rabbit since I was born. There are 12 zodiac sings and therefore I am 36 years old now.

Although so insecure I feel about what's going on next year and the year after next year, I have managed to survive so far. It's absolutely awful to be on tenterhooks, but I am gratified to have a one-year-old son celebrating the date of my birth with me.

Smoke gets in your eyes

2011-04-04T17:35:00.005+08:00

(Listen to the British version 'Smoke Gets in Your Eyes' by Elsie Carlisle, 1934)

Of course we don't see clearly when we fall in love. However, I suppose when smoke gets in my eyes, wow, it's painful. Not only will it cause temporary vision loss, but also trigger coughs and bring tears trickling down the cheeks.

Before I bought this record, the only thing I knew about 'Smoke Gets In Your Eyes' was that it is an oldie, probably similar to something like 'Moon River'. Never had I realised that it is a 1930s jazz standard, as old as the celebrated 'Over The Rainbow' and 'Summer time', nor had I been aware of this British version recorded only one year after its composition.

According to Stanley Green's famous Broadway reference book Broadway Musicals: Show by Show, which I purchased about twenty years ago at a secondhand bookshop, it is originally a song written for the 1933 Broadway musical Roberta by the composer Jerome Kern and the lyricist Otto Harbach.

Just like many other evergreen pieces, 'Smoke Gets In Your Eyes' has been covered by several dozens of artists, of which the household name would probably be the doo wop group The Platters. The cover version they made in 1958, the very one I would think of when this tune rings out, reached number one on Billboard Hot 100.

Enjoy the British interpretation of this classic piece by Elsie Carlisle, the most popular radio performer in England in the 1930s. It's slightly faster than the covered one performed by The Platters.

Here come the lyrics for your reference.

They asked me how I knew
My true love was true
Oh, I of course replied
Something here inside
Cannot be denied

They said someday you'll find
All who love are blind
Oh, when your heart's on fire
You must realize
Smoke gets in your eyes

So I chaffed them and I gaily laughed
To think they could doubt my love
Yet today my love has flown away
I am without my love

Now laughing friends deride
Tears I can not hide
Oh, so I smile and say
When a lovely flame dies
Smoke gets in your eyes

A patchwork of profile portraits

2011-03-30T17:12:00.003+08:00

Since the introduction of online activities or services such as instant messaging, blogging or microblogging, social networking websites and so on, there has been a need to create profile pictures or display photos. People would usually either take a snapshot with the built-in camera on a laptop or carefully select a spiffy one from a pile of existing photos.

It seems to me that savvy internet surfers, or those who are au courant with the cyber scene, are obliged to change profile pictures, so much so that I would produce interesting personal portrait from time to time in order to have a wee change and keep up with the trends.

I cannot remember how many portraits I have made so far and for which sites or applications those images were prepared. However, I am able to assemble some of them into a patchwork. No matter how each individual segment look like, the whole canvas is not bad at all, isn’t it?

Chinese Laundry Blues

2011-03-21T14:38:00.006+08:00

(Listen to 'Chinese Blues' by George Formby, to the accompaniment of the Jack Hylton Band, 1932)

It's common to see, especially in old films, the stereotype of East Asian immigrants in the States as owners of specific small business such as restaurants, groceries and laundries. These figures are usually part of backdrops but never part of main story lines. I don't really remember any film about, say, a Chinese grocer, a Korean laundress or a Japanese sushi chef produced in Hollywood.

However, there is a record of an interesting song, 'Chinese Blues', written by a British singer-songwriter and comedian Geroge Formby, in which a fictitious laundry owner, Mr Wu, lost his heart to a Chinese girl and his laundry has all gone wrong. Here Mr Wu is the leading role, rather than an extra.

George Formby was most remembered for playing the banjolele, a kind of instrument with an American round banjo body and a Hawaiian fretted ukulele neck, and for singing his original comical songs. (See the photo, quoted from Slap & Tickle)

On a website dedicated to him, George is praised as a great person who "could hold a live audience in the palm of his hand as he sang and played the ukulele in his own inimitable style."

Composed in 1932, 'Chinese Blues' was his first successful record and later adopted by himself as the signature tune, with the renamed title 'Chinese Laundry Blues'.

Stereotypical figure as Mr Wu may be and perhaps some early-twentieth-century racism, prejudice and inappropriateness as there may be, I won't take it too seriously. Never mind. Replacing 'Mr Wu' with 'Uncle Sam', 'Chinese girl' with 'Scottish lass', 'Chinese Laundry Blues' with 'New York Laundry Blues', or whatever, I still see the Laurel-and-Hardy- or Chaplin-style hilarity.

Please refer to the lyrics below to see the whole picture of this song.

Now Mr. Wu was a laundry man in a shop with an old green door.
He'll iron all day your linen away, he really makes me sore.
He's lost his heart to a Chinese girl and his laundry's all gone wrong.
All day he'll flirt and scorch your shirt, that's why I'm singing this song.
Oh Mr. Wu, what shall I do, I'm feeling kind of Limehouse Chinese Laundry Blues.

This funny feeling keeps round me stealing
Oh won’t you throw your sweetheart over do.
My vest's so short that it won't fit my little brother.
And my new Sunday shirt has got a perforated rudder.
Mr. Wu, what shall I do, I'm feeling kind of Limehouse Chinese Laundry Blues.

Now Mr. Wu, he's got a naughty eye that flickers.
You ought to see it wobble when he's ironing ladies blouses.
Mr. Wu, what shall I do, I'm feeling kind of Limehouse Chinese Laundry Blues.

Now Mr. Wu, he's got a laundry kind of tricky,
He'll starch my shirts and collars but he'll never touch my waistcoat.
Mr. Wu, what shall I do, I'm feeling kind of Limehouse Chinese Laundry Blues.

Compiling my family genealogy chart

2011-03-18T17:31:00.006+08:00

For about two weeks, since Ronne's birthday, I have been collecting names and dates about the Chen family and finally traced its history back to the 1660s.

My [great]⁸ grandfather was born in 1669, and his third son, i.e. my [great]⁷ grandfather, born in 1790, immigrated to Taiwan from Quanzhou (泉州), Fujian around the mid-18th century.

With all the relevant information, I have managed to draw a genealogical chart, spanning from myself, the 28th generation, to [great]⁸ grandfather, the 18th generation of the Chens.

It's a pity that names and dates before the 17th generation are still unknown. I have yet to consult more genealogy books compiled by other clan members in early years.

It is the Chinese tradition to record male members and their spouses in a genealogy book. The one kept by my father was compiled in 1983 to supersede the old one which had been produced in 1923.

Nevertheless, fortunately, I haven't got more than the names on this chart, otherwise I wouldn't be able to arrange them neatly within an A3 sheet. Ronne can collect more in the future.

Ronne's first birthday

2011-03-07T13:15:00.007+08:00

(Wow, there is a cake for me with a lit '1' candle)

My son Ronne was born on 5 March 2010 in the Gregorian calendar and therefore we should have celebrated his first birthday last weekend. However, we didn't, because we had had.

My mum argues (she ‘argues’) that we ought to abide by the lunar calendar when it comes to life-cycle celebrations or anniversaries, just like how we have Chinese New Year and other traditional festivals. As a result, instead, we held Ronne’s birthday celebration two weeks ago instead, on the 20th day of the first lunar month, which fell on 22 February this year.

Yes, Grannie. You're the Grannie and thus whatever you wish counts.

(Hey cakie cake, I'm coming!)

(I'm behaving. I'm just trying to count 'one' with my finger.)

(Gotcha!)

A laughing song for the smiling father and son

2011-02-21T13:08:00.003+08:00

(Top: Ronne in my arm, 2010/ bottom: Wei in Grandpa's arm, 1975)

Fanne nags at me all the time for keeping a stiff upper lip too often but seldom wearing a smile, so much so that I almost believe I had been born with an attitude of determined endurance in the face of adversity, and was therefore unemotional.

Of course not true. I was able to smile, or even laugh, although I don't smile a lot today.

When searching for old photos, I also found one taken in 1975 when I was about four months old. I was smiling, with a plastic film canister in my mouth, in Grandpa's arm. The image brings to mind a picture I took for my son when he was about four months old as well. The father and son were both smiling, weren't they?

However, I have to say that Ronne smiles and laughs much more often than I did and do. He does, and therefore at the end of this blog entry, let me play a record of laughing song.

(Listen to 'The Laughing Policeman' by Charles Penrose, 1926)

This song was performed by Charles Penrose, a British music hall singer and radio comedian, who was probably best known and is still remembered today for this laughing song. In addition to the one we are listening to here, Charles had also made several recordings for this piece, of which the first was released in 1922 under Regal (G7816) and two more were Regal (G9391) in 1929 and Columbia (FB1184) in 1934.

Although, on the paper label as shown above, the song was written by Billie Grey, the pseudonym of Charles's wife, it was actually adapted from 'The Laughing Song' by George W. Johnson, who had also recorded the song for many times, of which one can be heard on this YouTube clip. George's tune inspired Charles to compose the new lyrics about the funny policeman.

Below is what Charles sings:

I know a fat old policeman
He's always on our street.
A fat and jolly red-faced man
He really is a treat.
He's too kind for a policeman
He's never known to frown.
And everybody says
He is the happiest man in town!.
(Ha ha ha ha ha ha)

He laughs upon point duty
He laughs upon his beat.
He laughs at everybody
When he's walking in the street.
He never can stop laughing
He says he's never tried.
But once he did arrest a man
And laughed until he cried!
(Ha ha ha ha ha ha)

His jolly face is wrinkled
And then he shut his eyes.
He opened his great big mouth
It was a wonderous size!
He said "I must arrest you!"
He didn't know what for.
And then he started laughing
Until he cracked his fat old jaw.
(Ha ha ha ha ha ha)

So if you chance to meet him
While walking 'round the town.
Shake him by his fat old hand
And give him half a crown.
His eyes will beam and sparkle
He'll gurgle with delight.
And then you'll start him laughing
With all his blessed might!
(Ha ha ha ha ha ha)

Digging out old family photos on the lantern festival

2011-02-18T09:31:00.008+08:00

(The Chens, Taichung 1979 and Taipei 2001)

(Listen to 'Home! Sweet Home!' by Deanna Durbin for First Love on Brunswick, 1939, especially played for these two photos. May time fly and our faces change with age, the familial ties remain steadfast.)

Yesterday was the lantern festival, which is generally regarded as the last day of the Chinese New Year and after which all lunar new year celebrations conclude. Therefore, Fanne and I, together with my son Ronne, went to dine with my parents.

I spent some time delving into an iron cabinet in my parents bedroom in search for some old photos taken in my primary school days. Tonnes of photos turned up, including those taken on my parents wedding day.

I didn't start the quest for the past out of nowhere. It all began with a primary school reunion event organised through FaceBook, which took place when I was in the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka working with other colleagues on a discography of historical recordings made in Taiwan during the Japanese colonial period.

After the event, which unfortunately I missed out, some classmates managed to locate most members of the class through FB and Google (what an era of cyber manhunt!) and are uploading old photos to our facebook group page. Therefore, I started looking for some photos taken at primary school and happened to find some more taken when I was even younger.

When a photo (above left) shot in my grandparents' garden in 1979 appeared, another one (above right) shot in 2002 came to my mind, together with melody of 'Home! Sweet Home!' composed by the Englishman Sir Henry Bishop.

Armstrong's smile at an unhurried pace

2011-02-08T12:49:00.004+08:00

(Listen to 'When You're Smiling' by Louis Armstrong on Okeh, 1929)

I heard Louis Armstrong's rich and sonorous voice in an iPhone 4 advert launched on the 7th of June last year—'When you're smiling, when you're smiling...' Somehow, I became besotted with the tune and it has lingered in my mind since.

During the Chinese new year, I stumbled upon a 78s record of 'When You're Smiling' made by Armstrong and his orchestra in 1929 on eBay. I won the bid with an unflinching determination to procure it at all costs. Interestingly, it is faster than what I heard in the advert; it's a different version.

As I'm sure the record is played correctly at 78 rpm and the 1929 version is the first one he had recorded for this piece, apparently, he slows down when recording again at a later stage.

Well, the elderly slow down both mentally and physically, partly because of the accumulation of biological changes over time and partly, I believe, owing to the way in which they view the world. The latter may apply to the interpretation of a musical work by a musician in the later stage of life.

Here is another example.

In 1955 the Canadian pianist Glenn Gould launched his career, as well as made his everlasting name over the classical world, by recording his debut album of J S Bach's Goldberg Variations (BWV 988). In 1981, the year before closed his piano lid permanently, he made another recording of this keyboard work.

Whereas in the debut album Gould plays at an unbelievable extreme tempo, in the valedictory recording he slows down, a lot.

Just like Gould, Armstrong slows down as well in the later version. I suppose both the pianist and the trumpeter held back to see a different world in music.

As I don't have the later version of Armstrong's 'When You Smile', watch the video clip of the iPhone 4 advert, where you can hear how the celebrated jazz maestro smiled at an unhurried pace.

Which one do you prefer?

Paris, Stay The Same

2011-02-03T14:34:00.002+08:00

(Listen to 'Paris, Stay The Same' from The Love Parade, by Maurice Chevalier on HMV, 1930)

I would say it's an utmost pleasure to receive an item won on eBay just in time before the new year holiday, during which the post service is not available.

I won one more bid on eBay several days ago for a gramophone record of a French actor, singer and popular vaudeville entertainer, Maurice Chevalier, singing 'Paris, Stay The Same' from the film The Love Parade. It arrived the day before the Chinese New Year's Eve.

Maurice was captivated in the front during national service as a POW for two years in the prison camp in Germany, where he studied English. With his enormous charm and charisma, Maurice made himself a star with American audiences after he arrived in Hollywood.

It's our impression that the French can't be asked to speak English (no offence to French readers, but it's true); however, there was once a great French stage artist who developed a successful career in Hollywood and even was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, for his roles in the film The Love Parade.

I once lived in Scotland for five years, where I sang in the Church of the Holy Rude Choir, Stirling City Choira and Stirling and Bridge of Allan Operatic Society, and therefore I understand, as a non-native speaker, it is quite a back-breaking and mind-grinding task to elbow one’s way on the crowded stage in a foreign land.

I truly adore Maurice Chevalier.

This bilingual song was one of the most captivating and enduring tunes from The Love Parade. Below are the lyrics for those who would like to know what the song is about.

You'll never miss me when I'm gone, Paris
But I know that I'll miss you.
You took a lot of pains in teaching me,
Why must we say "Adieu"?

I've seen your mild days,
And some of your wild days,
Down where the Seine flows,
And where the Champagne flows,
You taught me all that a kiss could be
Paris, your ladies were good enough for me,

I've met brunettes, here,
And little brisettes, here
I've lost my station,
And my reputation,
If I've been happy then you're to blame...
Oh, Paris--please stay the same!

Paris je t'aime,
je t'aime, je t'aime
Avec ivresse,
Comme une maîtresse !
Tu m'oublieras bien vite et pourtant
Mon cœur est tout chaviré en te quittant !

Je peux te dire
qu'avec ton sourire
Tu m'as pris l'âme
Ainsi qu'une femme
Tout en moi est à toi pour toujours
Paris, je t'aime et comment ! - d'amour !

Writing my own Chinese New Year couplet

2011-02-01T12:29:00.003+08:00

I don't think I'm good at Chinese calligraphy at all but I write my own new year couplet (春聯 chunlian) with a Chinese writing brush every year. I usually prepare two pairs of couplets, one to be hung outside beside the main door of my flat and the other of my office at National Taiwan University.

Since I regard myself as a musicologist, the couplet must have something to do with music. This year I compose a pair of lines which may be translated roughly as

"Southern school and northern style win a standing ovation (南音北管滿堂彩);
Court music and secular ditties be praised throughout seasons (雅樂俗謠四季紅)."

The handwritting may not be perfect, but I hope the couplet bring me some good luck in the year of the rabbit—the year of my zodiac sign.

Fetching a rabbit money box for the year of the rabbit

2011-01-31T17:09:00.008+08:00

(Four money boxes released by Shin Kong Mituskoshi since 2008: from left, Rat, Ox, Tiger and Rabbit)

I suppose once you've started collecting something, particularly a series of cards, models or whatever collectable items, you would definitely do your best to grab all the whole series.

Shin Kong Mituskoshi, probably the biggest department store chain in Taiwan, began to issue ceramic saving banks in shapes of twelve Chinese zodiac animals, each of which would come in twelve consecutive years. The saving banks cannot be purchased straightaway; but instead, it can only be redeemed for or bought when a customer spends more than certain amount of money.

My dear wife Fanne started collecting these piggy banks in 2008, the year of the rat, and so far we have had the rat, the ox and the tiger at home. Certainly we would like to have the rabbit. However, all rabbit money boxes were gone on the first day.

Therefore, I had no alternative but tried to hunt for one over the Internet. Fortunately, as I believe, there are always people flogging whatever items they snapped up. I made a successful bit on Ruten, an auction site in Taiwan.

Now the rabbit joins the series. There are eight more to come.

The English codified, but didn't invent, football

2011-01-19T09:54:00.007+08:00

(Cuju, depicting the emperor and royal officials playing football, by Huang Shen 黃慎, 1755. Image from ChinaArts.)

While busy marking students papers as other university colleagues would be, I manage to squeeze time out of my waking hours to read.

Last night, before taking my routine cold shower, I encounter such an interesting point given by the Irish stand-up comedian Dara Ó Briain , which came to his mind when spending an afternoon in the National Football Museum in Manchester, England.

The English didn't invent football. They codified it, which is a different thing altogether, and a less emotive thing to shout about when you next to qualify for World Cup. You didn't invent football because you didn't invent the ball, or kicking, or fields. We should only be grateful that the Victorians didn't gather together in a room and write the first rules for the use of the wheel, or fire, so that you can claim credit for that as well.

quoted from Dara's latest book Tickling the English, p 30.

Certainly Dara offered this comment in a playful manner, but he is damn right. The English are not the first to play the ball by foot. Cuju (蹴鞠, literally 'kicking ball') had been a means of military training, as well as a recreational activity for the general public, in Ancient China during the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD).

Some regard cuju as the forerunner of modern association football, of which the history spans only about 150 years. However, cuju began to decline in popularity in China during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and finally replaced by football imported from the West.

A table for a table top gramophone

2011-01-17T13:38:00.003+08:00

I was going to fetch myself just one table for a table top gramophone, but, trapped into their promotional offer and unable to resist it—25% off on a second item of any furniture, finally ended up buying one more chair.

Since HMV 103 is designed as a table top gramophone and thus shall not just lie on the floor, I have be hunting for a proper 'table' for it. This machine measures 15" wide and 18¼" deep. However, as side tables or hallway tables usually come in no more than 15" deep, not until last Saturday, after a two-month search, did I find an ideal piece at Piin, a home product and furniture dealer who imported to Taiwan items from over 20 countries all over the world.

Now the table top stands firmly on a table befittingly as it ought, whereas its master can ensconce in this unsophisticated, elegant carved wood chair.

The French adaptation of 'Auld Lang Syne'

2011-01-06T14:32:00.007+08:00

(Listen to 'Valser Dans L'ombre'—the French 'Auld Lang Syne' in waltz, by Marie José, 1946)

In most English-speaking counties, while in the last few weeks during the buildup to Christmas, people would be bombarded relentlessly and repeatedly with tonnes of holiday songs, such as the brutal 'Jingle Bells' and 'Adeste Fideles', at midnight of the last day of a year, only one song, 'Auld Lang Syne', would be sung to usher in the new year.

'Auld Lang Syne' is a Scots poem composed, or partially composed as shown in some historical discussion, by the Scottish poet Robert Burns, sung to a pentatonic Scottish folk tune.

Although there are actually five verses in 'Auld Lang Syne', based on my five years' life experience in Britain, most people, even the Scots themselves, only remember the first one, just as most British people only remember and sing the first verse of their national anthem 'God Save The Queen' even though there are actually six.

However, whereas 'God Save The Queen' is normally delivered by a band only once on all occasions lest the vocal part become completely muted at remaining five verses, which may cause embarrassment, 'Auld Lang Syne' is usually played several times and people would still hum to the instrumental accompaniment even though they can't properly articulate every single word of the rest.

I am sure 'Auld Lang Syne' has been adapted into many different languages and used as a farewell or ending to various occasions, but I've never heard any French version until I encountered last year an interesting waltz arrangement with an interlude featuring the tune of 'Londonderry Air'.

It is on the gramophone record of a French song, 'Un Soir D'amour Sur Le Colorado' by Marie José, I purchased from eBay. As I didn't expect anything particular on the other side of that record, it really excited me when 'Valser Dans L'ombre', as shown on the paper label, turned out to be the French 'Auld Lang Syne'.

Another new year has arrived

2011-01-01T13:00:00.007+08:00

(Click to enlarge and see how I have changed over the past five years)

For the fifth time in a row since the year end 2006, I went to the fireworks display launched from Taipei 101 Tower last night.

Just as I have been doggedly keeping a handwritten diary for the last 20 years, so will I maintain the ritual of counting down to New Year at the same spot two blocks away from the 101 Tower and then taking a photo thereafter. As long as Blogger keeps its business, I shall upload a set of comparative photos every year.

I thought, when ushering in the new year last year, that one more member would join us a year later. However, tonight we decided to leave him in bed in the care of his grannie so that his circadian rhythm would not be interrupted.

As usual, we had another dazzling New Year's Eve, but I was really fed up with the warning weather forecast, which had been delivered incessantly in all media channels since last Monday, that a sharp plunge in temperature was to seize Taipei at New Year's Eve and people should be prepared for bitter cold, with a severe low of 5 °C.

However, the temperature was actually 9.7 °C at mid night. Unprecedentedly severe cold eve? I'm so glad the endlessly bombarding of weather warnings has stopped for now.

A ride on Dad's back to the whistling of 'Colonel Bogey'

2010-12-29T14:16:00.014+08:00

(Howdy, pals!)

(Yee-hah! Faster, faster!)

Love is a many-splendored thing, and so, I believe, is watching a child grow up day by day.

This notion struck me when I was listening to 'Love Is A Many-Splendored Thing', a song which won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for its debut in a 1955 romantic-drama film of the same title.

I used to drum to soothe my son when he, as a three-month-old baby, could only lie on the sofa and listen to it quietly rather than respond to it exuberantly.

After we had our first gramophone at home, I don't play the frame drum for him as often as I did, but instead I play gramophone records.

As a ten-months-old one who stands firm on his feet and has already taken his first three steps, he can now ride on my back while listening to 'Colonel Bogey March', a famous tune composed in 1914 and made known to more audiences in the world through the 1957 film The Bridge on the River Kwai.

Riding on Dad's back to the whistling of this march has now become a routine pre-bed exercise. I have no idea how long it would last before my son gets bored with the song, but at the moment it's his favourite.

(The record of 'Colonel Borgey March' I have recently purchased from eBay, a very unusual version pressed by Makolit in Israel under license from Fonit Italia, performed by Nino Impallomeni, whom I could hardly find any information about, and his orchestra. As this performance is very much different to the one in the film, I will convert it to a digital format to share with my readers next year.)

Glocalised postmodern 'Jingle Bells'

2010-12-24T16:40:00.005+08:00

(A fantabulous and thought-evoking version of a festive song created by two Indians, Nupur Bhargava and Amartya Rahut)

At a symposium in Portugal in 1996, Prof Philip Tagg, when presenting a paper on otherness and its problems in the study of popular music, commented that the term postmodern

had been adopted as a defeatist intellectual strategy by the kind of colleague who seems more set on wearing trendy conceptual garb on the catwalk of cultural studies (including musicology) than in shedding light on the mediation of ideologies in the modern mass media.

And he found otherness equally tricky.

I would like to add one more equally, if not worse, awkward term on the list—globalisation, together with its upgraded version glocalisation.

Having read tonnes of publications criticising such academic conceptual terms and in an effort to make life simple, I usually joke with my students by offering them some rules on how to apply these jargons to things around them.

Judging from your life experience,

In the circumstances where things, which should not be present at the same time, are sharply juxtaposed, it is postmodernism;
In the circumstances where things, which originally belong to the West (actually West Europe and North America only), are relocated in the East (wherever Near East, Middle East or Far East), it is globalisation;
In the circumstances where things in case 2 are not only relocated but also twisted to accommodate Eastern tastes, it is glocalisation.

Therefore, this Punjabi-style 'Jingle Bell' is a good example of postmodernism and glocalisation.

This YouTube clip has been around for more than one year. On this particular day, Christmas Eve, it is really appropriate to share it with readers of my weblog.

The glory (???) of the human voice

2010-12-20T01:32:00.004+08:00

(Madame Jenkins's LP, RCA Red Seal, LM-2597)

As requested by Hongyi, an old friend, here we have a 'hauntingly beautiful' masterpiece, an essential recording made by Florence Foster Jenkins, a would-be American soprano who made her name by showing complete absence of any sense of pitch and rhythm and thus singing ability.

Listen to 'Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen' (Hell's vengeance boils in my heart), an aria, which is better knows as The Queen of the Night Aria, from Mozart's opera Die Zauberflöte (The magic flute).

See, it is absolutely a demonstration of Madame Jenkins' s great passion for singing but complete deficiency of aptitude for engaging in this demanding activity. I particularly revere the piano accompanist Cosmé McMoon, who had exhibited great musicality, as well as tolerance, by offering such a vital instrumental background for the singing.

However, this recording is unique and, I believe, has an immensely uplifting effect. I actually came to know 'The Queen of the Night Aria' through this hauntingly beautiful version and therefore had it imprinted so deeply on my mind that for a long while the normal rendition by, for example, Kiri Te Kanawa would sound abnormal to me.

The everlasting tango 'La Cumparsita'

2010-12-16T14:30:00.003+08:00

(Listen to 'La Cumparsita', the most recognisable tango, by Orquesta Típica Francisco Canaro, 1933)

Tango, particularly the Argentine tango rather than the international standard ballroom one, has recently been very popular in Taiwan. In addition to dance, enthusiasts adore the strong rhythmic pulsation and engaging melodic lines filled with a nostalgic sentiment delivered by the bandoneón in music. They discern musical and choreographic differences between Argentine and ballroom tango; they hold the former in high esteem and deem it authentic.

However, most people may not realise that both the two metropolises on Río de la Plata Buenos Aires and Montevideo, capitals of Argentina and Uruguay respectively, contributed a lot to the development of the dance and music, although the former somehow, in the end, dominated the scene and became known to the world as 'city of tango'.

'La Cumparsita', the most recognisable tango piece, if not any less than 'Por Una Cabeza', and thus almost synonymous with tango, was actually an instrumental work written by the Uruguayan composer and journalist Gerardo Matos Rodríguez in 1917. In the 1920s, 'La Cumparsita' arrived in Paris, from which it spread to the world to become a synonym for tango.

In 1997, eighty years after its birth, it was made Himno Cultural Y Popular ('cultural and popular anthem') of Uruguay by law.

The audio clip here is from a gramophone record I have recently won from eBay, recorded in 1933 by Francisco Canaro with his Orquesta Típica (a tango orchestra consisting of a string, a bandoneón and a rhythmic sections), who in 1925 arrived in Paris where tango was the new fashion and met the composer there.

'The Sabre Dance': a close harmony pop trio version

2010-11-25T17:45:00.008+08:00

(Listen to the vocal 'Sabre Dance'!)

'The Sabre Dance' is actually a movement in the final act of Gayane, a ballet in 4 acts with music written in 1942 by the Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian, in which male dancers display perform a war dance with sabres in their hands.

I suppose most people would be able to recognise this piece by the chromatic and gliding notes in the melody, as well as the stirring rhythmic pulsation, even though they cannot really name it.

This orchestral work later become a popular concert piece in its own right. However, no until recently, after discovering a 78s record from eBay, have I realised that there are actually a series of adaptations by various pop singers and rockers.

I finally won the bid for that record—a vocal version of 'The Sabre Dance' by The Andrews Sisters, a renowned close harmony trio active from the swing up to the 1960s, to the accompaniment of three harmonicas by The Harmonica Gentlemen.

(The Andrews Sisters, image from their official website)

Having been bidding for 78s records on eBay since September, I not only found some software for the hardware, my HMV 101 and 103, but also lead myself to a world of the sounds which have long faded into oblivion.

Laluna Park: a Hebrew waltz

2010-11-20T01:10:00.000+08:00

('Abale Bo Laluna Park', by Israel Yitzhaki, 1950s)

I've definitely fallen for gramophone records and will keep searching for more—either something I have already known but just want to hear in the warm pure analogue format, or something people have forgotten long before and not available on CDs or over the internet.

Last night, just one minute before shut down my laptop, that is two minutes before I crawled into my four-poster, I discovered a rare, rare, rare record on the eBay: Israel Yitzhaki's 'Abale Bo Laluna Park' (אבאל'ה בוא ללונה פארק Daddy come to the amusement park), a Hebrew waltz song.

I cannot remember how I came to know this waltz, but this is a example I usually give in class when introducing popular music of Israel in the modern times. 'Abale Bo Laluna Park' is really a cute piece, both musically and lyrically, about a child's request for a carousel ride in the amusement park.

For those who are interested in what the song is actually about, please refer to the transliterated lyrics and translation, quoted from hebrewsong.com.

Im tikach otti la’luna park
If you take me to Luna Park

Tir'eh eich ani e’yeh yeld tov
You’ll see what a good boy I’ll be

Mehayom letova estaneh
As of today I will change for the better

Ve’ehdal lehagid lo rotzeh
And stop saying 'I don’t want to'

Abbaleh bo la’luna park
Daddy, lets go to Luna Park

Nirkav al hasus halavan
We’ll ride on the white horse

Abbaleh bo la’luna park
Daddy, lets go to Luna Park

Tihyeh gam atta chevreman
Come on be a sport

Abbaleh bo la’luna park
Daddy, lets go to Luna Park

Sham nechmad, aliz ve’niflah
It nice there, cheerful and wonderful

Abba’e bo la’luna park
Daddy, lets go to Luna Park

Nit’nad’ned al hanad’nedah
We’ll sway on the swing

Nissa nistovev bagal’gal ha’anak
We’ll circle riding the Ferris wheel

Yihye ko yaffe’ shneinu nitzhak
It will be so beautiful, we’ll both be laughing

Lema’la lematta, yamina u’smol
Up and down, right and left

Al tifchad, ani lo epol
Don’t worry, I won’t fall down

Abbaleh bo la’luna park
Daddy, lets go to Luna Park

Nirkav al hasus halavan
We’ll ride on the white horse

Abbaleh bo la’luna park
Daddy, lets go to Luna Park

Tihyeh gam atta chevreman
Come on be a sport

A celebratory Hebrew song for a Taiwanese funeral

2010-11-18T16:22:00.004+08:00

('Hava Nagila', Hebrew song performed by Israeli singer Rika Zaraï, ca 1966)

'Hava Nagila' (Let us rejoice, lieterally), almost a standard dance number for Jewish weddings, as well as Bar and Bat Mitzvoth, is a Hebrew song, of which the tune was actually adapted from a niggun (a wordless humming tune) of a Hassidic branch of Judaism in Ukraine with the text written in 1918 by Abraham Zevi Idelsohn, the father of Jewish musicology.

It was originally written for a concert in celebration of British victory over the Turks in Palestine in WWI, together with the Balfour Declaration, which stated the British government's stance in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people. By setting simple Hebrew lyrics to the Ukrainian Hassidic tune, Idelsohn wrote 'Hava Nagila' as a cheerful concluding song for the concert organised by himself.

In terms of melodic structure, the song can be divided into three sections, the text set to which can roughly translate as

Let's rejoice and be happy!
Let's sing and be happy!
Awake, brothers, with a happy heart!

Indeed, it is a cheery, jaunty song.

This song has recently been quoted in Seven Days In Heaven, a Taiwanese film presenting the seven days of the Taoist mourning ritual in succession before the funeral after a father's decease and its impacts on his children.

I wonder whether the two collaborating directors of this film, Yu-Lin Wang and Essay Liu, have no knowledge of the celebratory idea behind 'Hava Nagila' but simply take it as a sonic background in the film, or their intention is to employ 'Hava Nagila' right away in the title sequence to deliver the message that a funeral may be a celebration of life as well.

Listen to Bach's haunting and astonishing organ music

2010-11-14T00:16:00.018+08:00

(Father and son listening to organ music on HMV 103)

J S Bach's 'Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (BWV 565)' is regarded as one of the most famous works in the organ repertoire; it's magnificent.

Listen to Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (BWV 565), played by the Italian organist Fernando Germani at Westminster Cathedral in 1948, and see if there is any unusual acoustic effect, different from that from modern digital recordings, that may redefine any listening experience.

Just as the initial distinctive four-note 'short-short-short-long' motif of Beethoven's 'Symphony No. 5 in C minor (Op 67)' usually come to mind when thinking of Western classical symphonic works, so would the astounding single-voice flourish at the very start of this 'Toccata and Fugue in D Minor' resound in people's head when talking about organ music.

However, I suppose this keyboard piece is more associated with scenes in horror films, in which it is frequently quoted, than the image of a dedicated maestro in the church organ loft.

As mentioned in the previous post, Ronne sometimes listens to music played on my gramophones so I just want to let him feel how haunting, as well as astonishing, this piece can be when delivered from the antique machine.

A must for the family, or for myself?

2010-11-08T14:16:00.000+08:00

(My new toy—HMV 103 table top, ca. 1925)

According to the built-in New Oxford American Dictionary provided by the Apple operation system Mac OS X 10.4, a toy can be

1) an object for a child to play with, typically a model or miniature replica of something, or

2) an object, especially a gadget or machine, regarded as providing amusement for an adult.

In a recent case of myself, definition 2) applies.

After buying myself an HMV 101 portable in early September, I was induced by Davide Lin to believe that a table top gramophone is also a must for every family (this sounds like words in advertising!), apart from a portable one. As a result, I bid again on eBay and won another 'toy'—an HMV 103 table top.

After my son Ronne was born, both my wife and I reserve Sundays for the family and, except for housework, we don't work, so we can he can play with us (or actually he can play us!). However, now I also reserve Sundays as gramophone days and Ronne has to sit beside me watching the funny black stuff turning round and round, and listening to the sound delivered from the magic wooden box.

In this society, where at the one end people would expend millions seeking hi-end Hi-Fi stereo system, and at the other people would listen to poor-quality downloaded illegal audio files, it may be a good idea to take my son back to the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, when advanced digital recording and playback technology were not available, but humanity and musicality were most important when making sound productions.

New portrait for Principal Wei's Weblog

2010-10-18T18:13:00.005+08:00

(Image created by Davide Lin)

Much the same as the way in which people can create a sonic bricolage by copying, cutting, splicing and overlapping audio files with sound editing software, nowadays people can also manipulate visual images with graphics editing programmes.

This morning when Davide and I talked about the previous post, 'Straighten warped 78s record', on my weblog, he somehow proposed that I should change the age-old portrait, the one with two broccoli spotlights projecting respectively from the two bottom corners, on the website and immediately created a new portrait for me.

I found out later that this portrait was a photoshopped work from a historical portrait of General Phil Sheridan, who, I suppose, never matters to Taiwanese people and is just a figure from Google images when Davide searched for images of 'general' over the internet.

Anyhow, I really appreciate Davide's hard work, although the work of photoshopping might cost him, someone who has a degree in graphic design, only a few minutes. I therefore add this portrait, in addition to the broccoli one, onto my weblog.

Straighten warped 78s record after recovering from fever

2010-10-17T16:22:00.007+08:00

I was struck down with flu in summer 2005 and haven't caught any flu or cold ever since, until three weeks ago this year. I had a fever of 39.5 °C for more than ten days and only recover from it last weekend. According to my doctor, my strong immunity system finally collapsed after a five-year free-from-flu holiday; it's about the time to spend some time in sickbay.

After having a hard, heated time, I was so eager to heat a 78s record.

I bought a 78s record of Cole Porter's 'I Get A Kick Out Of You', delivered by Henry Hall and the BBC Dance Orchestra, and it arrived at my door three weeks ago, just before the flu knocked my out. It was somehow curved and couldn't play smoothly, but I was so debilitated that I couldn't be bothered to mend it.

This morning, I spent half an hour heating the record by waving a running hair dryer around it with a heavy mug in the centre. Fortunately, the warped record was straighten and could play perfectly after all the effort.

I'm so glad the trick works; I've never thought that a 78s record could be fixed in this way. Now I can enjoy 'I Get A Kick Out Of You', originally written for the Broadway musical Anything Goes and the film of the same name.

(Image from IMP Awards)

Here comes what it sings:

I get no kick from Champagne
Mere alchohol doesn't thrill me at all
So tell me why should it be true
That I get a kick out of you

Some get a kick from cocain
I'm sure that if i took even one sniff
That would bore me terrificly too
Yet I get a kick out of you

I get a kick every time I see
You standing there before me
I get a kick though its clear to me
You obviously don't adore me

I get no kick in a plane
Flying too high with some guy in the sky
Is my idea of nothing to do
Yet I get a kick out of you

Here comes Bollywood!

2010-09-25T03:20:00.006+08:00

(Paper label of one of the Bollywood records I bought, with the song title Dil me chupa ke)

I'm so glad that the two 78s records I bought from eBay arrived today, just before the weekend and very much earlier than I expected. The seller, based in India, stated on his eBay page that international delivery would usually take 20 days, but the records came in 10 days.

They are definitely going to be the focus of the micro-soundscape in the Chen family this weekend.

The four songs on the two records I received today are from Aan (आन, pride), a Hindi musical film which features an acclaimed soundtrack of ten songs. Among these four my favourite is 'Dil me chupa ke' (roughly translated as 'Hidden in my heart') sung by the famous playback singer Mohammed Rafi.

Listen to it; it's absolutely fantabulous. It really made my day.

(DVD available on WebMall India)

For those who are interested in what the song is actually about, please refer to the transliterated lyrics and translation, quoted as in Desi Film & Music - Bollywood Songs Lyrics.

Dil Mein Chupake Pyar ka Toofan le Chale
Keeping it secret in my heart, I am carrying the storms of my love

Hum aaj appni mauth ka samaan le chale
today I am carrying the ingredients/power of my death

Mauth ka samaan le chale
Carrying the tools/ingredients of my death

Dil mein Chupake Pyar ka Toofan Le Chale
Hidden in my heart, I am carrying the storms of love

Ha Ha Ha AAA
Mit ta hein kaun dekhiye ulfat ki raah mein
Let's see who gets destroyed in the pathways to love/friendship

Ulfat ki raah mein
in the pathways of love

Mit ta hei kaun dekhiye ulfat ki raah mein
Woh le Chale hein aan to ham jaan le chale
he is taking the oath so I am taking the life/soul

Maut ka Saman le chale
carring the power of death

Dil Mein...
in my heart

Ha Ha Ha AAA
Manzil pe hoga Fasla Kismat ke Khel ka
At the destination there may be distances for the games of destiny

Kismat ke Khel ka
for the games played by destiny

Manzil pe hoga Fasla kismat ke khel ka
Kare jo dil ka khoon wo
He who kills the heart

Meheman le Chale
am Taking that visitor along

Maut ka saman le chale
carrying the tool of my death

Dil Mein...
in my heart

Our first-ever HMV gramophone at home

2010-09-18T17:18:00.001+08:00

Just as a Chinese saying goes, 'Even the cleverest housewife cannot cook a meal without rice (巧婦難為無米之炊),' so I deem that a well preserved and properly serviced vintage gramophone cannot demonstrate its magic capacity of sound reproduction without a 78s record.

Although having long ago finished a doctoral thesis on popular music in 1930s and 1940s Shanghai and still conducting researches on music in the first half of the twentieth centry, I've never thought of having a gramophone at home until about three weeks ago.

Somehow, I was convinced that there should be a gramophone at home. Thus, I place a bid on eBay and won an HMV 101 portable immdiately after returning from the holiday in Britain. The machine arrived in great condition last Friday.

However, I couldn't operate it in the first place. The turntable did 'turn', but no music would come out as I had no records to play. Fortunately, two 78s records I bought from, again, eBay arrived yestday after a long wait.

This morning, while playing a record with my son in my arms stunned by the marvelous talking machine, the image of this most recognised dog in the world surfaced on my mind.

(Image taken from Wikimedia Commons)

Whereas in the painting, on which the HMV logo was based, the dog Nipper was listening to 'his master's voice' coming out through the horn of a wind-up gramophone, at Principle Wei's home, the father and son were watching the magic machine delivering the Hebrew folk song 'Hava Nagila'.

(The vintage Decca 78s produced in the 1940s—the first record purchased in my life and the first one played on this machine at my home)

We're on VOGUE cover

2010-09-12T08:54:00.001+08:00

Fanne was out of town on business for four days and therefore I played single fahter again. She returned home yesterday.

To make up for the family time we had lost when Fanne was away, we went to a department store on Sunday afternoon.

By chance VOGUE was, in association with some makeup brands, holding an event, in which customers who spent more than certain amount of money were offered a professional photo shoot for free.

As Fanne splurged a lot to replenish the empty drawers of her dressing table with tonnes of cleansers, lotions and cream, we were eligible for such a photography service.

So, we're on VOGUE cover (well, actually 'against' VOGUE wall).

Another tough academic year head

2010-09-03T10:51:00.004+08:00

Time flies; it's September 2010, only two weeks away from the new semester. My schedule was so tight during summer break that I just cannot believe I have already had a two-month summer break.

I received an award for the course I offered in Autumn 2009, 'Musical Cultures Around the Globe', the same thing I had received in 2008—'distinguished general education course'.

I was also, probably because of the award, requested to offer the same course in the whole July in certain summer college, organised by my University in collaboration with other twelve universities in North Taiwan. Thus, apart from those from my University, there were some more external students to look after.

All hard work paid off. I received the best score in a course evaluation among all the courses offered at the end of the summer college, and was invited to deliver a speech on teaching skills and course planning to other teachers in a symposium in November.

Immediately after the summer course, I flew back with Fanne and Ronne to Britain for in early August Ronne's christening, and thereafter travelled to Korea in late August to present a paper in a conference for East Asian musics.

After all these summer tasks were completed, I was notified yesterday that the long-promised TWD 2 million grant was finally confirmed (what a bloody long procedure and thus a bloody long wait) and is coming in mid September. The long waiting times once made me so nervous and insecure that at one point I thought the grant had been nullified, when misreading an announcement of certain grant results and not able to spot the project title on the list.

Right, more money is coming and so is more pressure. Since it's an industry-academia collaboration project, we have to work closely with IT engineers and programmers of our industry partner, and at the same time I will be teaching two courses. Moreover, as the grant is for the employment of more research assistants (not funding towards my own salary!), I will be busy producing a lot of contract renewal paperwork near the year end.

Hjckrrh, I don't think I'm ready for all of these.

How can you read all the texts on screen?

2010-08-29T19:49:00.003+08:00

I hadn't had any opportunity to watch news channels or browse news sites over the Internet when I had been in Korea for a conference, from the 24th to 27th of August, so it was particularly touching when I saw this familiar layout of an image on a news channel this afternoon.

There are six news channels over the cable TV network in Taiwan, broadcasting 24 hours a day, 7 days week. As every channel would try its best to offer the general public all sorts of information as much as possible, apart from the news image or clip and the main caption or headline for it, there may also be up to three news tickers running at the same time, together with other information such as date, time and weather forecast on screen.

Sometimes I really wonder if all the audience members have a brilliant command of speed reading or can simply comprehend more than one message thread simultaneously.

Look at this screenshot I took this afternoon, if it was a running video clip rather than a still shot, how many block of texts would you be able to read at once?

I have no idea how a news channel look in Korea, but having left Taiwan for only four days, I really miss those Taiwanes text-overloading news channels.

Same places, one more member

2010-08-18T20:32:00.002+08:00

(Mum and Dad with the wee one, southbound platform, Pitlochry Railway Station, August 2010 )

(The newlyweds, southbound platform, Pitlochry Railway Station, June 2007)

Three years after my wedding, I returned to Stirling with my wife and son, and had him baptised in Church of the Holy Rude.

A couple of days before the baptism, we managed to visit again Pitlochry, the town where we spent our honeymoon, and took several photos at the same spots where we had taken some during the honeymoon.

Do Mum and Dad look any different?

(Mum and Dad with the wee one, Moulin Inn, Pitlochry, August 2010 )

(The newlyweds, Moulin Inn, Pitlochry, June 2007)

On Polaroid: feast at the end of the semester

2010-08-17T16:05:00.000+08:00

I should have posted this Polaroid photo earlier. Although compared with a digital photo, its resolution is definitely much lower, I just love its aged texture.

Since I started my full-time postdoctoral job in 2009, I have been inviting members in my database construction team to a feast at the end of every semester, and sometimes sort of fellowship dinner during the semester as well, in return for their hard work and to encourage teamwork cohesion. Most of the time, research assistants who share the same office with us would also join us.

After Ronne was born in early March, I have to go home on time every weekday to cook dinner and share child care responsibilities with Fanne, and spare the weekend for families, so no dinner event was held during the spring semester 2010.

However, I managed to gather my team members and some colleagues to have a good feed at a Cantonese restaurant on the 29th of July, about a week before I flew to Britain.

Pei-Hsiu, an alumna of our graduate institute, offered one of her last three Polaroid instant films, which have been discontinued, to capture the image of these well pleased folks. A nice shot, isn't it?

Three-year-old wedding cake ready to be served again

2010-08-04T14:17:00.005+08:00

(Lovely small two-layered wedding cake, Church of the Holy Rude, 23 June 2007)

It's about the halfway point of the summer vacation and I've just finished a one-month intensive summer course on musical cultures around the globe. After working industriously on my own project and the summer course for a whole month, I am ready to take a vacation to Britain.

When Fanne and I were married in the Church of the Holy Rude, we were told that the top layer of the wedding cake had to be saved for the christening. Margaret, my former landlady, kindly kept it in her deep freezer for us and now it is going to be re-iced and decorated by Tricia, the lady who made it for us three years ago.

In the past, it was popular to have a three-layered wedding cake: the bottom layer served in the reception, the second distributed to the guests and the top saved for the christening. However, as nowadays the wedding is not necessarily associated with the first child's christening, although multi-layered wedding cakes are still in vogue, the top layer may be saved for the couple's first anniversary, or simply eaten up after the ceremony.

I am so glad that we follow the tradition. The top layer will be served after the baptism.

I also feel so privileged that we could be married in the church where Jame VI, the last King of Scots, had been crowned and that my son is going to be baptised in the same church.

Sinister expression on Ronne's face

2010-07-23T13:17:00.006+08:00

There must have been something wrong with the camera, or probably with the light, room temperature, relative humidity, air pressure, et cetera, et cetera. How could my son, who is four and a half months old, look into the lens with such a sinister expression on his face.

Compared with the one below, this is definitely wicked!

I was told by relatives and friends with children that babies may show their first hints of smile, as a reaction to another person rather than reflex from gas, as early as five weeks, but it becomes more regular by twelve weeks. By six months, most babies would smile at people they know best.

I wonder when a baby starts giving a grudging expression to show disapproval or reluctance, out of will rather than physical needs such as hunger or discomfort.

'Nobel Laureate only' parking space

2010-07-17T13:38:00.009+08:00

This is not news, but is new to me.

The sign seems to have been there since late 2007, shortly before I was hired as an adjunct assistant professor at National Taiwan University. However, I only came to know this yesterday through a non-NTU student who is in the course I am running for the summer college.

As there is only one among the academic staff at National Taiwan University, Prof Yuan Tseh Lee, who has ever won a Nobel Prize, this location is absolutely reserved for Professor Lee.

Such a reserved parking space once aroused criticism. Some considered it a waste of space because Prof Lee (a part-time distinguished research chair rather than a full-time fellow) only came to the campus occasionally and there were more who badly needed it.

Well, I don't think it is something entirely nonsensical as there is a similar policy at UC Berkely. Nevertheless, I suppose the parking authority there is obviously much less verbose than that at NTU.

(image from National Public Radio News)

Chanting a Tibetan blessing at a wedding

2010-07-11T18:18:00.004+08:00

I was invited to chant a Tibetan blessing yesterday at the wedding of Wawa, the former assistant at the Graduate Institute of Musicology, NTU whom I have known at least since 2002 I guess. I was assigned a special task at the wedding—chanting a Tibetan blessing for the couple during their procession into the banquet hall.

I believe there are tonnes of musical pieces to which a bride and her bridegroom may walk down the isle, such as a pop like Elvis Presley's 'I Can't Help Falling in Love' or a serious classic like Marc-Antoine Charpentier's 'Prélude du Te Deum' or a liché like Richard Wagner's 'Wedding March'. However, Wawa and her husband requested a Tibetan blessing chanted in the Gyuto-monk-style overtone singing.

I had no idea if the bride's and groom's families and the guests were shocked when the couple walked into the wedding banquet to this unconventional 'song'.

The blessing I 'sang' was actually composed by two parts, the former the Padmasambhava mantra and the latter a prayer Tibetan people would recite at the New Year's Eve. I put the two together to wish the guests good health and peace of mind and the newlyweds prosperity and fullness.

For those who would like to know how the blessing sounds, listen to it.

I would be more than happy to do something similar for whoever needs this as long as the guests are not against it.

The angelic smile on my son's face

2010-06-29T18:10:00.000+08:00

(Although not shot professionally with even lighting, the smile is still a smile.)

What can be more rewarding than seeing the angelic smile on my son's face after a long exhausting day full of reading, marking, commenting and the so-called academic critical thinking?

Before my son was born, producing more journal papers and finding a secured academic job is the centre of my life, but now affording my son a carefree childhood, both spiritually and materially, has become another centre.

Just like an ellipse, there are now two foci in my life and thus a delicate balance between professionalism and family has to be maintained so that the ellipse can be kept regularly oval rather than transformed into an egg.

While seeking the balance, I find I have to work more efficiently in, and only in, the daytime on weekdays and reserve the evenings and the weekend for my son. This definitely applies to any working parent and not something extraordinary. However, I do enjoy the lifestyle changes of parenthood.

Above all, this is simply part of life and a must of life.

Lost tradition of the telecast dragon boat race

2010-06-17T18:26:00.003+08:00

(Image from China Times Magazine)

Yesterday was the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar calendar—Dragon Boat Festival, or Duanwu Festival 端午節 known in most Chinese-speaking societies.

When I was a boy and when there were only three state-controlled terrestrial TV channels (TTV, CTV and CTS), on Dragon Festival my family and I usually watched the live telecast of dragon boat races. We would switch channels all the times in order to avoid adverts and try to watch as much as possible the live singing show staged just on the bank of the river where a boat race was held, which was usually organised by the TV channel that telecast the race.

However, it seems that few people would watch this sort of live broadcast dragon boat race and singing performance because I saw no programme, even a recorded broadcast, of any dragon boat races yesterday on any of the channels (either cable or wireless services ) available nowadays in Taiwan.

Therefore it is not profitable for a TV channel to produce a live broadcast of a dragon boat race along with a live singing show and we shall see no more telecast dragon boat races on TV.

Capturing a transient smile

2010-06-13T15:30:00.005+08:00

As I said, when you have a baby and happen to maintain a blog, the blog will become an online album for the photos you would take for your child.

Fanne took this photo by chance on Sunday afternoon. It is so cute that I just can't help but upload it immediately to share with the readers of Principle Wei's weblog.

Although professional photographers know that they have to produce dozens of images to get a picture that satisfies them, for us amateurs, seizing the moment 'by chance' is good enough.

How is Ronne in comparison with my Mahakala face?

My Mahakala face with a taqiyah

2010-06-12T15:22:00.001+08:00

(Graduate Wei-Qian, Professor Tsai, Jing-Ting with seven candles and myself with a Uyghur dap)

Jing-Ting bought two taqiyahs, short rounded caps worn by male Muslims, and gave me one as a present, for no reason. But I guess it has something to do with our successful collaboration and mutual-benefit 'boss-employee' relationship.

We've been working together so well that my course, 'Musical Cultures Around the Globe', is awarded again as 'distinguished general education course, autumn 2009' and he is also awarded again as 'distinguished teaching assistant, autumn 2009'.

The Graduate Institute of Musicology where I work as a postdoctoral fellow had a graduation celebration for our master students last Friday. Jing-Tin and I put on the caps for this special occasion. As we have been studying Arabic classical music and the culture, we consider this a kind of culture exhibition rather than merely culture appropriation.

The photo was taken on this special day.

As one of our graduates, Wei-Qian, has just finished her dissertation on Chinese revolution opera under Professor Tsai's supervision. Jing-Ting and I asked the maestro and disciple to take a photo with some dramatic postures as those Beijing opera performers would do. While Wei-Qian was too shy to show off, Professor Tsai did demonstrate an energetic facial expression.

To complement Professor Tsai's demonstration, I offered my Mahakala expression.

Beef tomato with pork stew

2010-06-07T17:55:00.003+08:00

(Not very clear as tomatoes have literally melted away, but still worth posting here as a picture 'sometimes' speaks a thousand words)

Aside from conducting research, delivering lectures and housekeeping, I suppose, in my case, cooking has now been included in the job description for Postdoctoral Fellow & Adjunct Assistant Professor as well.

There are certainly nothing commoner than research and lecturing in academia. However, as a person who believes that everything has its place in a divinely designed way (designed by myself, which should not be questioned), from time to time I have to spruce up the office to make everything shipshape and Bristol fashion. It's for my own good.

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned to students and assistants working in the same office that beef tomatoes are perfect complement for Chinese-style pork stew, though it's unusual to see tomatoes cooked with pork in Chinese cuisine. No sooner had I put a full stop at the end of the sentence, they asked for a piece of hard evidence—a piping hot, ready-to-eat dish.

Therefore, I spent six hours on Sunday evening cooking a pot of pork stew to demonstrate how well beef tomatoes go with pork and their palates were persuaded today.

Here is a list of the important ingredients, in addition to pork, I used to cook this dish:

Veggies: diced beef tomato and diced carrot
Herbs and spices: ginger, spring onion, fresh basil, chilli
Sauce: Soya sauce, Chinese cooking wine, Chinese black rice vinegar and brown sugar, and of course water

Well, no measurements are given here because I've never tried to measure them up. However, I believe foodies can always discover the quantity of ingredients.

Assistants and students are requesting more, and therefore cooking is now part of my job.

Drumming to soothe my son

2010-05-31T09:19:00.011+08:00

With the help of Google, we can find out millions of web pages offering theories behind why a baby cries and practical guides to calm and soothe a crying baby. However, I have my own musical approaches.

If my son keeps crying even after his physical needs are totally met, I would try the following two:

a) Playing Arabo-Andalusian classical music CDs for him, just as I played for prenatal education and during labour and delivery.

b) Singing Mongolian khoomei or chanting Tibetan mantras for him, again as I did during pregnancy, labour and delivery.

These two usually suffice.

Nevertheless, in order not to bore him , recently I have developed a new approach: playing the Uzbek frame drum doira. It works very well. Once the travelling pressure wave set up by the pulsation of the vibrating drum membrane reaches him, he stops crying and then gazes into my swaying hands and the doira.

Rather than the complicated Uzbek classical rhythms,I usually play for my son some Arabic rhythmic patterns, which can be easily heard nowadays because of the growing popularity of the so-called belly dance. Among the various drumming patterns, he seems to prefer the maqsum.

How does he look?

Course package uploaded to Course Database of General Education

2010-05-27T17:37:00.003+08:00

The package of course materials I made earlier this year has passed the evaluation procedure and is finally uploaded to the website of Course Database of General Education, Taiwan.

The PowerPoint sides, audio-visual clips, handouts, reading lists and other necessary materials of the course are now available for university lecturers to download. The whole package is also accessible to the general public and thus those who would like to learn at home may use these on-line materials.

The construction team of the database has again commissioned me to make a video course for this package. How encouraging it is. I shall be very busy this summer.

Singing karaoke continuously for seven hours

2010-05-18T14:34:00.005+08:00

I went to Holiday KTV with three research assistants yesterday morning at seven o'clock, and we stayed there until two o'clock in the afternoon. No joking. We had been singing for seven hours.

It's absolutely great value for money; it cost only NTD 341 (roughly just more than USD 10.00) each person.

A 'KTV' is a type of karaoke establishment which consists of several individual rooms equipped with karaoke machines and audio-visual systems to be rented out for time periods.

Whereas in the West, speaking from my own experience in Britain, people who enjoy singing in public usually use karaoke equipment at restaurants, pubs or other similar venues, in some Asian countries, such as Taiwan, China and Japan, apart from such places, people may go to KTV to sing in a cosier, private atmosphere.

Right, but what does KTV have to do with karaoke? I've done some research and drawn an inference.

Karaoke=kara ( 空 ‘empty’) + ōkesutora (オーケストラ ‘orchestra’)

MTV = Music TeleVision
(originally referring to music video but later on the term for establishments with rooms to hire for watching videos)

KTV = Karaoke TeleVision = Karaoke + MTV

I think this is how the term KTV came into being.

Just like 'google', originally a noun but now a verb, 'K' becomes a verb in Taiwan and 'to K songs' simply means to go singing in a KTV. Thus, we had been K-ing songs yesterday for seven hours from morning to afternoon—what a luxury start of a day.

¡Feliz Compleaños! Jing-Ting

2010-05-14T10:18:00.012+08:00

My teaching, as well as research, assistant, Jing-Ting was born 24 years ago today.

Therefore, I am writing to wish him a very happy birthday and hope everything goes well with him in the coming 365 days until the 25th anniversary of his birth, on which I shall wish him another wish.

The picture was taken on the last day of 2009, when we had a New Year's Eve party in the Graduate Institute of Musicology, for which the dress code was 'creatively ugly' (You can see in the photo below how 'ugly' I was).

It's really a pleasure to have such an assistant, from whom I've also learnt a lot.

Sometimes I even find my own reflection in him—perseverance with what should be properly explored and learnt, fastidiousness about accuracy and detail, and the belief that everything has its place in a divinely designed way (actually our own way) which could not be questioned.

Although sometimes perseverance and fastidiousness are both just another form of stubbornness, with such determination we keep the standard and quality.

Anyhow, as he is learning to sing a flamenco alegrías, with great 'perseverance', on his 24th birthday I send him my best wishes, Feliz Compleaños!

(How are my Japanese wooden slippers?)

Three days' single-parent

2010-05-11T01:48:00.001+08:00

(Behaving good with Dad a home)

Yesterday was mother's day and Fanne's own first mother's day. We celebrated it by working overtime at home while Ronne was having a siesta—Fanne prepared the budget and strategic plans for the next five years for her business, whereas I worked on a paper which I should have submitted a century ago.

We also shared a cup of coffee, but she gobbled down a custard before she remembered to spare a bite for me. There was nothing else for this special day. However, she received something as a special gift from me: three days out of town on business while I look after the baby.

I don't think it is a tough task to take care of a child on oneself for just three days, as there are so many single-parents who have to rely on themselves for several years.

I have to feed Ronne once in the morning before we take a taxi to the baby school. He then stays at school all day while I preach to students. We taxi home in the early evening. The first thing back home is to bathe him and feed him. Then I cook dinner for myself while Ronne has a nap. After bedtime feeding is done before eleven o'clock, I can call it a day.

Hence, if a single-parent can care for one or more children without the assistance of the other biological parent in the home, then I can't find any reason for which I can't look after the baby when Fanne's is out of town for three days.

(After a cosy bath)

Is my son a weirdo or is it just the magic power of Arabic music?

2010-05-06T11:19:00.001+08:00

(Sound, sound sleep)

My son Ronne turns two months old today and he has managed to sleep through the night for several days. He goes to bed at 22.00 and wakes up at 06.00 next day, which means a full night of uninterrupted sleep for Fanne and me.

According to National Sleep Foundation:

For newborns, sleep during the early months occurs around the clock and the sleep-wake cycle interacts with the need to be fed, changed and nurtured.

and

By six months of age, nighttime feedings are usually not necessary and many infants sleep through the night; 70-80 percent will do so by nine months of age.

Hence, I believe Ronne is a bit ahead of the timetable, which is a bit weird.

As the saying goes, 'like father, like son'; I am a weirdo, so is Ronne. However, I somehow believe it may have something to do with the Arabic music I have been playing throughout Fanne's pregnancy, labour and delivery, and since Ronne's birth.

Perhaps there is certain mysterious power in Arabo-Andalusian classical music, which imbues peace and tranquility from all around our home.

Nevertheless, it is really unusual that a two-month-old baby sleeps through the night without the need to be fed before the dawn.

(Father and son, both asleep, just like how the father would fall asleep anytime, anywhere)

A bagpipe on the bottle of ale from Café Bastille

2010-05-05T00:15:00.002+08:00

Yesterday afternoon, in business hours, my teaching assistant and I went to Café Bastille, a bistro which serves food and a wide range of Belgium beer, near National Taiwan Normal University. Certainly we were there for a bottle (unfortunately not a 'pint', as beer is not sold in pints in Taiwan); however, we were actually on a mission (i.e. serious business) and thus we deserved a bottle.

Look at the painting behind us. Not clear enough? Then look at the one below.

(Image from Wikimedia Commons)

In order to have a good start and grab students' attention right away, I always show a painting that carries some 'music' (music instruments, most of the time) every week at the beginning of my 'Musical Cultures Around the Globe' class.

The artwork for the this week's course 'Europe' is The Peasant Dance by the famous Netherlandish Renaissance painter Pieter Bruegel, in which it requires some efforts to discover the 'music'—a bagpipe at the centre left on the canvas. This Flemish bagpipe, called doedelzak or pijpzak in Dutch, has two single-reed drones which face directly up when played.

Still not clear enough? Then look at the bottle of Brugel Amber Ale on which is the male character who plays the bagpipe in Brugel's painting.

I just want to emphasise to the students that there are indeed various types of bagpipes in Europe and the Scottish great Highland bagpipe, to which most people are familiar, is just one of them.Therefore, we went to Café Bastille to take a photo for us and the replica painting, as well as to have some ale so that we can take away the bottle and show it in class.

What a good afternoon—working while making merry in business hours.

Who would make a good parent?

2010-04-26T12:06:00.008+08:00

(Hey, what are you searching for?)

(Obviously you've learnt when to look into the lens.)

Holding a baby is a delightful, as well as delicate, job. Because a newborn baby's neck muscles are quite weak and hence has little control over the head, when holding an infant, it is of utmost importance to support the head and neck at all times to prevent the head from flopping back.

While many people would not try to hold a young baby, some do enjoy having an infant in their arms. However, those who want to start a family will have to do it sooner or later, and what's more, they will have to bathe their newborns as well (another tough but enjoyable task).

Some of my colleagues came to visit Fanne and Ronne last Saturday and certainly they all had to perform a ritual, from which one would hardly escape when paying a visit to a newborn baby—holing the infant. Thus, the two parents and three guests had their photos shot as a memento of this event.

Whether single or in a relationship or married, as none of our visitors has already started a family, last Saturday's visit was absolutely a good exercise for them.

So, who would make a good parent?

(Lucy, single, a member in my database construction team, who started working in 'my' office even before I started)

(Jing-Ting, in a relationship, my teaching assistant, who was awarded Distinguished Teaching Assistant for two terms in a row)

(Carla, married, a former member in my database construction team, who still works in the same office with me)

Weird and coincident: funeral song for my birthday

2010-04-10T23:22:00.012+08:00

('A Thousand Winds', kikawa Masafumi)

In celebration of my 35th birthday, last night, on my birthday eve, May and I went to Riverside Live House (河岸留言西門紅樓展演館), where the young Taiwan aboriginal singer Leo Chen (陳永龍) and the indie rock group Clippers Band (夾子電動大樂隊) had two gigs in a row.

It was a very enjoyable night. However, I'm not going to comment here on the two delightful performances, but instead I would like to highlight a Japanese song which Leo Chen presented to end his session in the first half.

Leo just released his first Mandarin album Come Rain or Shine (日光雨中), a collection of classic songs written by Li Tai-Hsiang (李泰祥), a well-respected composer in Taiwan. As 'Farewell' (告別) is the lead track in this album, Leo had a theme of 'Farewell' at last night's performance and sang, apart from several pieces from the album, some more songs about valediction.

It was 'A Thousand Winds' (千の風になって) that captured my ears. The song derived from the well-known bereavement poem 'Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep', which is usually read at funerals or memorial services, and sometimes carved on tombstones.

The verse was translated into Japanese, set to music and first performed by a Japanese novelist, Arai Man (新井満).

Last year, I gave May, as a birthday present, the single album of 'A Thousand Winds' by the Japanese tenor Akikawa Masafumi (秋川雅史), which once reached No.1 on Oricon Singles Weekly Ranking (オリコンチャート) in 2007 and has since sold more than one million copies in Japan.

This year May invited me, also as a birthday present, to a gig, where Leo Chen delivered 'A Thousand Winds'. Neither of us expected this song in the programme.

It is absolutely a beautiful song although weird is the word I could say for this coincidence.

More photos of Ronne

2010-04-09T11:31:00.006+08:00

Finally, I can make sense of what seemed to be unexplainable to me in the past. When you have a baby:

If you happen to have a digital camera, the number of the photos you would take for your child within a month will probably far exceed that of the images you have captured for yourself in the first half of your life.
If you happen to maintain a blog, it will become an online album for the photos you would take for your child.

Therefore, I hereby upload more photos of my beloved son.

(Who do you resemble, Wei or Fanne?)

(That would be a very sound sleep)

(Hey laddie, don't be startled, as you are learning to recognise your long-haired and goateed father.)

April Fool's pranks not necessarily well appreciated

2010-04-02T12:53:00.002+08:00

(BMW's 2010 April Fool's ad)

I still remember that British media outlets would usually have a break from their daily business of delivering hard news and turn to pull some hoaxes on their readers or viewers on April Fool's Day. When British people find odd news stories or nonsensical adverts, they would probably take such items as the sign of the arrival of April Fool's Day.

In comparison to Britons, Taiwanese people seems to be far less enthusiastic about April Fool's Day pranks. What's worse, some people would even take offence when receiving text message jokes.

Vibo Telecom, a 3G mobile service provider in Taiwan, sent such a text message to all its customers:

Because of poor air quality, you are advised to throw it on the floor should your mobile receive no signal or not stay connected. Just throw harder, and several times later, the mobile will resume its normal function Happy April Fool's Day!

Some of Vibo's users who have long been annoyed by poor signal reception were absolutely furious at this 'joke'. One lady almost banged her mobile on the floor before reading carefully to the last few words.

I suppose before making a joke, the administration should evaluate if the company's service is up to certain standard and therefore appropriate to joke with.

In Britain long established companies produce hoax advert in the broadsheet press to offer the general public good laughter on the 1st of April every year. For example, visit BMW Education website in the UK to see some good April Fool's ads. I don't think BMW would have such a tradition if their cars stall all the time.

He grows so fast

2010-03-22T18:07:00.006+08:00

In general, an infant grows about a sixth inch a day. How is my son?

Seeking silver linings while going through peaks and troughs

2010-03-20T11:03:00.006+08:00

Life is indeed a series of peaks and troughs, and I have just experienced a lot in last two weeks. While every cloud has a silver lining, I wonder if some of them would show up to me.

05 March My son was born.

06 March My laptop kept freezing itself and therefore had to be forced quit again and again while I was busy preparing lectures for the next week in the hospital.

08 March My son was diagnosed with neonatal jaundice and thus had to stay for another two days in the hospital.

09 March The laptop couldn't even start up when I had to revise powerpoint slides for the next day's lecture.

10 March An Apple retailer in Taipei replaced the motherboard for me with no charge, because there was a design fault.

11 March My son was discharged after two days' treatment for jaundice.

12 March The DVD-ROM drive collapsed in the morning (No joking, the spindle did break). The retailer came to the university, collected the laptop and replaced the damaged drive within one hour. However, they charged this time, but fortunately the University paid it.

16 March I was told that the grant I requested for attending a conference in Philadelphia, where I would present a paper in a panel, was denied—seven days before flight.

19 March Another panellist's grant was rejected by the National Science Council, the same funding authority as mine—even worse, four days before the flight.

The panel we had been planning for since last June is falling apart now, as two of the four members of the panel will be absent. How could they send us such a short notice that we didn't even have two more weeks to seek alternative funding?

Well, it seems that my less-than-one-month-old son would like me to stay in Taiwan with him. Fine, then I stay.

Music from mediaeval Moorish Spain for labour and delivery

2010-03-06T10:31:00.009+08:00

(Ronne and Fanne)

I was with Fanne throughout the whole process in the so-called LDR suite, a special room which provides a home-like setting while being equipped with hi-tech monitoring and delivery devices. Labour, Delivery and immediate Recovery after delivery all took place in this room. We can also play any music we like (of course on CD, not by a live band) to create an even more living-room atmosphere.

As I had been playing lots of Arabo-Andalusian classical music for Fanne during her pregnancy, I thought it would be a good idea to do the same in the LDR suite. I chose my favourite album El Agua de la Alhambra by Eduardo Paniagua, an architect and musician specialising in mediaeval Spanish music.

What impressed me the most was a question the obstetrician asked when supervising the labour and delivery.

Doctor: What does the dad-to-be teach at the university?
Myself: Musical cultures around the Globe.
Doctor: Wow, no wonder, the music sounds quite interesting. Is it from Middle East?
Myself: Well, yes, in one sense. It is from medieval Andalusia, part of the Islamic Empire.
Doctor: Then the Moors must have played an important role in it... Interesting, interesting...
Myself: Definitely, definitely... (speechless)

The doctor certainly has a wide range of interests in addition to his professional knowledge. I love this LDR suite!

Baby born at 16.54

2010-03-05T18:01:00.003+08:00

Congratulations on my fatherhood and praises for my son.

Well done, my boy! You did follow my instruction and arrived on Friday rather than other busy weekdays.

Overdue!

2010-03-03T23:45:00.003+08:00

Hey kid, what do you mean by giving me such a v-gesture while overstaying in your mum's womb? Have you made up your mind when to come out?

Warm sunshine for a spring boy

2010-02-21T15:21:00.005+08:00

It's the end of the nine-day Chinese New Year holiday, as well as the longest-ever five-week winter vacation (students in Taiwan usually have 20 days off for winter break). The new semester will commence tomorrow and it is sunny again after an endless rainy period.

For the first three weeks of the vacation, I had been busy working on the package of course materials for 'Musical Cultures Around the Globe', as mentioned in the previous entry. Then I spent another week before the New Year holiday preparing more supplementary course materials, in addition to the completed powerpoint slides, such as lists of further reading and audio-visual resources, copyright information of all the audio-visual content used in this course pack.

Finally, Fanne and I passed the cold, rain-soaked New Year in Taipei, most of the time at home, as we are expecting our baby on 1st March and advised not to take long-distance trips.

It's been wet throughout the New Year holiday but the sun broke through this morning at last. Although I have no idea if my boy will be a cold weather person, just like his father, I'm sure he would rather arrive on earth on a warm spring day than on a bone-chilling raining day.

My contribution to the Course Database for General Education

2010-02-07T18:22:00.003+08:00

I've spent almost forty days since the New Year Day 2010 and now finally completed a package of course materials for my award-winning 'Musical Cultures Around the Globe'. I can now relax and waiting for the baby to come.

After receiving the award, I was soon commissioned by the General Education TW to make a package of course materials, including PowerPoint sides, audio-visual clips, handouts, reading lists and other necessary stuff, for the Course Database for General Education. These materials will be added to the database and soon available for all the university lecturers and professors in Taiwan.

Apart from the introductory chapter, there are 14 units in this course – an opening chapter dealing with general ideas of music in different cultures and the record industry, 12 chapters on specific regions or peoples and a concluding chapter on music and culture exchange among different regions and in the global market.

It's good to be recognised; it's also good to be requested to contribute.

One day, if my son takes a course at university in world music (or musical cultures around the globe, the title I personally prefer to 'world music'), he will probably encounter the slides and reading lists designed by his father.

Grannie's dining table and chairs

2010-01-03T13:59:00.007+08:00

(The house partially concealed by the huge blooming bougainvillea tree on the right, where Fanne spent her childhood and teenage years before she went to university)

Fanne has just transferred from her digital camera to my laptop some photos we took last December when we had a holiday in Hualian, the harbour town where Fanne grew up.

It was not a holiday; we actually went to Hualian to arrange delivery of a dining table set, which we were to take by order of her Majesty, my mother-in-law.

As the table-and-chair set were bought in 1993 when Fanne left home for university and she didn't dine at it very much, I suppose, my mother-in-law would like her grandchild to be fed and raised up at this table.

Because the house has been vacant for more than ten years, a pane of the exterior doors was jammed and the table could not go through the gateway. As a result, it took me some time to take apart the windows so that the table could be moved out of the house.

Hey my lad, since, about ten weeks before your due date, we went to Mum's home to collect Grannie's dining table in sweated labout , you'd better cultivate good table manners or you'll be ordered to take them back to that house.

Here comes 2010

2010-01-02T13:23:00.000+08:00

(Click to enlarge and see how slowly my hairs grew in the past few years)

As mentioned in the blog post last year, I've taken another new year photo.

For the fourth time in a row since the year end 2006, I went to the 188-second fireworks display staged at the Taipei 101 Tower ushering in the new year.

Of course Fanne stood beside me as in the last three times, but we had one more member, who had no choice but was forced, to accompany us—our expected baby. I'm sure this member will be with us again counting down to 2011, with no choice.

What year-end surprises

2009-12-31T18:23:00.000+08:00

On the last day of 2009, I received two official papers, one in the morning when I walked into my office and the other in the late afternoon just two minutes before I shut down my laptop and said 'see you next year' to my assistants and other colleagues.

The morning paper informs me that my proposal for an industry-university collaboration project has been approved and TWD 2 million (USD 62,000) will be granted by the University to recruit more full-time research assistants for my database construction project.

The afternoon paper confirms that my postdoctoral contract has been renewed, with a pay rise.

Taiwanese people believe that children always bring their own fortune so that parents will have necessary financial resources to raise them up. Although I was a bit disappointed when I came to know it was a boy, not a girl as I wished, well, I believe he will be a source of strength and confidence for me.

Adiós, 2009.

A tight daily schedule for a weekday

2009-12-23T13:26:00.001+08:00

It's been two months since Fanne and I moved to our new flat. In order to look after pregnant Fanne and the expected baby, I conduct my weekday life according to a strict daily schedule.

06.45 Leave my four-poster bed without any hesitation

07.00 Cook breakfast

07.20 Have breakfast with Fanne

07.45 Wash crockery, cutlery and pans, as well as clean the kitchen

08.00 Empty rubbish and recycling bins

08.20 March to my office with my chin up and shoulders back

08.50 Have a cup of Lipton Yellow Label

09.00 (a)Make simple facts more complicated in my office so that they become esoteric and understood by only a small number of people with compartmentalised and specialised academic knowledge; or

(b)Explain complicated matters in an effortless during lectures in an undemanding manner so that students will never learn know enough and I remain authoritative

14.00 Figure out if I have had lunch and, if not, feed myself and then keep working on the aforementioned task (a) or (b)

18.00 Return home in an anxious fashion

18.30 Have a cup of tea made from Taiwanese loose-leaf green tea which was brewed in the morning and left unattended during the day

18.45 Cooking dinner

20.00 Welcome Fanne back by giving her a tepid greeting, and then serve and dine with her

21.30 Wash crockery, cutlery and pans, as well as clean the kitchen, again

22.00 Embed myself firmly in the sofa, watching Japanese drama on TV and reading whatever printed publications at the same time

23.30 Shower myself with chilly water to remind myself of my existence

24.00 Call the day a day and enter my four-poster

This is my weekday life and life will go on.

The Shamisen Club without a shamisen

2009-11-25T11:36:00.004+08:00

(London Shamisen Club, live in Taipei 101)

Requested by London Shamisen Club, I am writing lyrics for two pieces, which the group will deliver in their upcoming gigs in Taipei.

London Shamisen Club consists of a mandola, a tablah (or darbuka, the goblet drum from Middle East and neighbouring areas, not the Indian tabla), a violin, a clarinet, percussion and sometimes other guest instruments. This group plays their original works, as well as rearranged folk music from a wide geographic range, including Greece, Argentine, Algeria, Cuba, Uyghur, Tajik, Malaysia and Turkey, with a 1950s retro-electro/dancehall flavour.

The key person of this group is the mandola player Tommo, who writes all the works and makes arrangements. Tommo has lived in London for so many years and thus, I believe, this Shamisen Club is called after the name of the city. However, I'm not sure about Shamisen, the Japanese three-string plucked instrument. Perhaps it has something to do with 'zen' or certain ancient Asian philosophy: because nobody plays shamisen in this group, it has to be named so.

Tommo would like me to give the two pieces a hint of showa kayo (昭和歌謡, 'ballads from the Shōwa period') and emphasises that showa kayo must not be confused with enka. As a purist who is obsessed about definitions and details, I have to listen to more song examples to discover the differences. I should write another entry for showa kayo later.

Anti-stress kit

2009-11-20T19:59:00.003+08:00

As we are approaching the end of 2009, many people are ready to go for Christmas celebrations and Hogmanay, while some academics are busy crafting term reports about their scholastic achievements and concocting project proposals to solicit more subsidies and secure their jobs.

I'm sure that most of my academic colleagues are really under pressure, just like myself, at the moment. In sympathy with some of my professional brethren, I would like to present an anti-stress kit, which I got from a member of the management team of NEXT, the shop where I worked as a cleaner when I studied in Stirling University, Scotland.

This kit worked very well on me when I struggled to finish my doctoral thesis, and thus I believe it will just run greatly for those who are under academic pressure. Some of my friends and colleagues in Stirling also found it useful.

As it's copyright-free, those who need it may print out as many as they wish or probably make some drink mats, and deliver them, as free samples, to their academic colleagues.

Right, let's fighting against stress.

I miss my first Spanish textbook

2009-11-05T16:13:00.004+08:00

Whenever I can't find an item, whatever if may be, and get wildly insane, my mum or Fanne usually calms me down and then assures me that one day it will turn out, especially when you pack up all the stuff for home moving.

However, although we've moved into our new home for three weeks, I still can't find out the Spanish textbook which I've mentioned to a lot of Spanish-speaking friends. It is definitely more than a language textbook; it is creative writing in practice.

I bought this textbook when I was a senior high school student at a secondhand bookstall in Taichung 16 years ago. It was printed by certain California-based publisher and seemed to be a textbook of Latin American Spanish, as I was told later that a lot of expressions in this book, such as comemos juntos y platicamos, were only used by people in Latin America, particularly in Mexico.

Nevertheless, what impressed me most was not those Latin American expressions, but the materials for conversation practice. I still remember the first four lessons in this book.

Lesson 1 is about daily greetings, such as Hola (Hello), Buenos días (Good day).

Lesson 2 teaches how to count in Spanish.

Lesson 3 gives some basic words including days of the week.

Lesson 4 starts conversations.

What a huge leap! How can you chat with others only with a few basic words and daily expressions? I'd never forget the two dialogues below for the rest of my life. They are certainly not from a textbook, but from an anthology of poems.

(I)
A: Hay un elefante en la estación.
     (There is an elephant in the station.)
B: ¡Es absolutamente ridículo!
     (That's absolutely ridiculous!)
A: Es mío.
     (It's mine.)
B: ¡Qué hombre tan raro!
     (What a strange man!)

(II)
A: Hay un gorila en la escuela.
     (There is a gorilla in the school.)
B: ¡Es absolutamente terrible!
     (That's absolutely terrible!)
A: Lo adopté.
     (I adopted him.)
B: ¡Qué hombre tan valiente!
     (What a brave man!)

This is literature, poetry, not language learning. I want this book back! Where is it?

Fanne's portrait

2009-10-30T10:01:00.007+08:00

We brought this portrait with us when moving into our new home two weeks ago.

This pencil sketch portrait was finished in 1995, when I was a second-year undergraduate student. It took me three months. I still have no idea how I did it and don't think I can do it again for the rest of my life.

Since I never took any sketch lesson, I read a lot of 'how-to' and 'for-dummies' books and practised all the necessary skills for quite a long time before I really started.

Moreover, Fanne rejected me and refused to give me a photo when I started my courtship, so I could only watch her from a distance and draught as much as possible. It was really a tough task for me.

However, it's now part of our fond memories of undergraduate days and the portrait will surely be passed down for generations.

The Lonely Accordion

2009-10-29T11:26:00.003+08:00

I received a request, probably an order, from May to learn a new song, 'The Lonely Accordion' (Gudu de shoufeng qin 孤獨的手風琴), the screen song of the latest film Prince of Tears (Lei wangzi 淚王子), so that I can sing it in a KTV (ie, a karaoke box, which consists of multiple rooms containing karaoke equipment to be rented for time periods).

It's a story which took place in a 'military-dependent village' (juanchun 眷村) of the air force in Taiwan during the White Terror era, the years when martial law and one-party dictatorship were imposed by the Nationalist government and numerous political dissidents and innocent suspects were imprisoned, tortured and eliminated.

The film is going to be screened tomorrow (30 October) in Taiwan, but the original sound track has already been released. May sent me a link to YouTube, the MV of the screen song, by the veteran Hong Kong singer Goerge Lam (林子祥).

The song is origianlly a famous Russian song 'The Lonely Accordion' (Одинокая бродит гармонь), composed by Boris Mokrousov in 1947, with lyrics by Mikhail Isakovsky. It's about a young accordionist walking alone at night in search of someone, against a backdrop of apple blossoms and a chill blowing in from the fields.

In the film the army pilot, who was imprisoned for suspected espionage, plays the accordion, and thus this melancholic Russian tune is especially chosen and adapted into a Mandarin song. It is the original Russian song that May asks me to sing.

Well, I found the Russian lyrics last night and will study it over the weekend. Next time when I visit a KTV, I shall sing in Russian while other singing the adapted Mandarin version.

Снова замерло всё до рассвета,
Дверь не скрипнет, не вспыхнет огонь.
Только слышно, на улице где-то
Одинокая бродит гармонь.

То пойдёт на поля, за ворота,
То обратно вернётся опять,
Словно ищет в потёмках кого-то
И не может никак отыскать.

Веет с поля ночная прохлада,
С яблонь цвет облетает густой...
Ты признайся - кого тебе надо,
Ты скажи, гармонист молодой.

Может, радость твоя недалёка,
Да не знает, её ли ты ждёшь...
Что ж ты бродишь всю ночь одиноко,
Что ж ты девушкам спать не даёшь!

Electric Soran

2009-09-30T16:41:00.006+08:00

Carla, a former assistant in the Taiwanese music history database project, is going to get married in November. Since I have been reading books and papers on dance music and started trying to produce some, I decided to make a short piece as an extra wedding congratulatory token for her.

This is my second attempt at making dance music. Adapted phrases from Felix Mendelssohn's 'Wedding March' and samples taken from two Taiwanese oldies are integrated into this track.

While to Western ears extracts from Taiwanese songs are unfamiliar and thus carry no significance, most Taiwanese listeners will recognise their association with a wedding.

The Taiwanese song is actually adapted from Soran bushi (ソーラン節), originally a kind of Japanese folk song of the herring fishermen in Hokkaido, the northernmost of the four main islands of Japan. Soran bushi is particular sung while transferring the herring from large drift nets into scoop nets.

While bushi simply means the song melody, soran is a vocable sung out repeatedly by the crowd in unison at the beginning and in the mid of the song to keep them in tune and in rhythm. Listen to a recorded Japanese version:

As soran sounds very much similar to the Taiwanese given name Solan (素蘭), when the Japanese song 'Soran bushi' was covered in Taiwanese to become a popular song in 1960s Taiwan, the original string of non-lexical vocables 'soran, soran, soran, soran...' was adapted into 'Miss Solan is going to get married'. Listen to the adapted Taiwanese version:

It's 'he', not 'she'.

2009-09-24T17:50:00.005+08:00

We have just had our third prenatal ultrasound examination. The foetus is growing well and Fanne is in good health. The baby is due in next early March.

Fanne has just bought a new flat and the home decorating project is almost finished. We'll move into the new flat in early October. So, in less than half a year's time, a new-born child will join the new home.

Sounds fabulous, isn't it? However, I'm not in the mood. What disillusionment! We were told today during the examination, it is he, not she. I thought I was going to have a daughter.

I think it'll take me at least a couple of months to recover from this.

Falling asleep in the office

2009-09-18T18:31:00.004+08:00

(Sound sleep, taken in Stirling, 2002)

I fell asleep in the office in the late afternoon yesterday while listening to some Shanghai oldies and preparing a playlist for next week's radio programme.

When I studied at Stirling University, I made my name cooking for colleagues and people from the local community, as well as falling asleep at midnight wherever I was. Whereas it's always a pleasure for a foodie to prepare a feast, it is absolutely a shame when someone drops off in a bustling jam-packed pub, a cheerful party organised by Greek students, or just an ordinary late night out on the town.

I used to be a part-time cleaner in the Thistles Shopping Centre in Stirling. I usually got up at 6.00 so that I had plenty of time to cook full breakfast and make sandwiches for lunch before I started the daily cleaning work at 7.00. Therefore, I had to go to bed at 12.00 midnight to get enough sleep. As my body's biological clock just functioned perfectly well, I always nodded off, and sometimes even got sound sleep, at midnight wherever I was.

I still remember that Pedro would always let me remain asleep and then woke me up at the end of the day, or probably the start of the next day.

I don't know whether I was just too tired or the circadian rhythm was reset by the heavy breakbeats and synthesizer-generated loops in the dance music I have been exploring recently. Anyway, as nobody noticed that I put my head down, it was not as bad as the case in the Greek party.