1.
Album
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Album, is a collection of audio recordings issued as a single item on CD, record, audio tape, or another medium. Albums of recorded music were developed in the early 20th century, first as books of individual 78rpm records, vinyl LPs are still issued, though in the 21st century album sales have mostly focused on compact disc and MP3 formats. The audio cassette was a format used from the late 1970s through to the 1990s alongside vinyl, an album may be recorded in a recording studio, in a concert venue, at home, in the field, or a mix of places. Recording may take a few hours to years to complete, usually in several takes with different parts recorded separately. Recordings that are done in one take without overdubbing are termed live, the majority of studio recordings contain an abundance of editing, sound effects, voice adjustments, etc. With modern recording technology, musicians can be recorded in separate rooms or at times while listening to the other parts using headphones. Album covers and liner notes are used, and sometimes additional information is provided, such as analysis of the recording, historically, the term album was applied to a collection of various items housed in a book format. In musical usage the word was used for collections of pieces of printed music from the early nineteenth century. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, the LP record, or 33 1⁄3 rpm microgroove vinyl record, is a gramophone record format introduced by Columbia Records in 1948. It was adopted by the industry as a standard format for the album. Apart from relatively minor refinements and the important later addition of stereophonic sound capability, the term album had been carried forward from the early nineteenth century when it had been used for collections of short pieces of music. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, as part of a trend of shifting sales in the music industry, some commenters have declared that the early 21st century experienced the death of the album. Sometimes shorter albums are referred to as mini-albums or EPs, Albums such as Tubular Bells, Amarok, Hergest Ridge by Mike Oldfield, and Yess Close to the Edge, include fewer than four tracks. There are no rules against artists such as Pinhead Gunpowder referring to their own releases under thirty minutes as albums. These are known as box sets, material is stored on an album in sections termed tracks, normally 11 or 12 tracks. A music track is a song or instrumental recording. The term is associated with popular music where separate tracks are known as album tracks. When vinyl records were the medium for audio recordings a track could be identified visually from the grooves
2.
Michael Nyman
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He has written six concerti, four string quartets, and many other chamber works, many for his Michael Nyman Band. He is also a performing pianist, Nyman prefers to write opera rather than other forms of music. Nyman was born in Stratford, London to a family of Polish secular Jewish furriers, Nyman was educated at the Sir George Monoux Grammar School, Walthamstow. He won the Howard Carr Memorial Prize for composition in July 1964, in 1965–66 Nyman secured a residency in Romania, to study folk-song, supported by a British Council bursary. It subsequently became the base for his 1977 piece In Re Don Giovanni and he wrote introductions for George Frideric Handels Concerti Grossi, Op.6 and conducted the most important interview with George Brecht in 1976. He wrote settings to various texts by Mozart for Letters, Riddles and Writs and he also produced a soundtrack for the silent film Man with a Movie Camera. Nymans popularity increased after he wrote the score to Jane Campions award-winning 1993 film The Piano, the album became a classical music best-seller. He was nominated for both a British Academy Award and a Golden Globe and his few forays into Hollywood have been Gattaca, Ravenous, and The End of the Affair. In 2000, he produced a new opera on the subject of cloning on a libretto by Victoria Hardie titled Facing Goya, the lead, a widowed art banker, is written for contralto and the role was first created by Hilary Summers. His newest operas are Man and Boy, Dada and Love Counts and he has also composed the music for the childrens television series Titch which is based on the books written and illustrated by Pat Hutchins. Many of Nymans works are written for his own ensemble, the Michael Nyman Band and this line up has been variously altered and augmented for some works. Nyman also published a book in 1974 on experimental music called Experimental Music, Cage and Beyond. In the 1970s, Nyman was a member of the Portsmouth Sinfonia – the self-described Worlds Worst Orchestra – playing on their recordings, Nyman created a similar group called Fosters Social Orchestra, which specialised in the work of Stephen Foster. One of their pieces appeared in the film Ravenous and a work, not used in the film. He has also recorded pop music with the Flying Lizards, a version of his Bird List from the soundtrack to Peter Greenaways The Falls appears on their album Fourth Wall as Hands 2 Take, on 7 July 2007, Nyman performed at Live Earth in Japan. On 2008 Nyman realised, in collaboration with the cultural association Volumina, Sublime, in October 2009, Nyman released The Glare, a collaborative collection of songs with David McAlmont, which cast his work in a new light. The album – recorded with the Michael Nyman Band – finds McAlmont putting lyrics based on news stories to 11 pieces of Nyman music drawn from different phases of his career. In 2012, he made a soundtrack for film Everyday, keith H. Yoo in 2012 commissioned Nyman to write a 26 minutes long piano quintet in four movements titled Through the Only Window
3.
Ute Lemper
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Ute Lemper is a German singer and actress renowned for her interpretation of the work of Kurt Weill. Born in Münster, Germany, Ute Gertrude Lemper was raised in a Roman Catholic family and she joined the jazz-rock music group known as the Panama Drive Band at the age of 16. Later, she graduated from the Dance Academy in Cologne and the Max Reinhardt Seminary Drama School in Vienna and she also dubbed the singing voices of Ariel in Disneys The Little Mermaid and Esmeralda in The Hunchback of Notre Dame for German-speaking audiences. In 1991 Ute Lemper participated in the Sanremo Music Festival with song The Photograph, a painter in the neoclassical style, Lempers paintings have been showcased in numerous galleries. Lemper, a mother of four, resides on the Upper West Side section of Manhattan in New York City and she performs worldwide, recently in the Middle East. Her autobiography was published in Berlin in 1995 and she has also authored several journal articles. She starred as Marie Antoinette for LAutrichienne, and subsequently appeared in such as Prorva, Bogus, Jean Galmot, aventurier, Prosperos Books, Appetite. She has contributed to the soundtracks of films, including The Voyager, Kissing Jessica Stein. In 2007, Lemper was a juror in Lets Dance, the German version of Dancing with the Stars and she recorded Illusions in 1992, devoted to the songs of Marlene Dietrich and Édith Piaf. She has numerous pop albums, variously in English, French, and German, Lemper is known for wild interpretations on discs like the Sondheim tribute City of Strangers, containing a particularly mannered version of the Elaine Stritch-popularized song The Ladies Who Lunch. In 1998, a Lemper compilation, All That Jazz, The Best of Ute Lemper, was released, in 2003 and 2006, Lempers songwriting talents were shown on her discs from those years as she moved from being an interpretive singer to a singer/songwriter
4.
London Records
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London Records is a record label in the U. K. that marketed records in the U. S, Canada, and Latin America from 1947 to 1979 before becoming semi-independent. London arose from the split in ownership between the British and American branches of Decca Records, the American branch released British Decca records in the U. S. since it could not use the Decca name there. The label was noted for classical albums made in then state-of-the-art stereophonic sound, by the 1960s more licensing deals had been made with Big Top, Monument, Parrot, Philles, and Hi, and subsidiary labels were London Atlantic, London Dot and London Monument. An unusual feature was the code in the numbering system. From the late 1950s until 1973, the label bore the logo London American Recordings, in America, the label was best known as the American imprint of the pre–1971 recordings of the Rolling Stones. The label also issued some early LPs and singles by Texas-based band ZZ Top. In the late 1970s, London signed deals with Bomp, Records and with Big Sound in Connecticut, U. S. This changed the label in the eyes of many from a backwater into something a little more edgy compared to the pedestrian contemporary releases from parent company Decca, the president of London Records in the 1970s was D. H. Tollerbond. After British Decca was acquired by PolyGram in 1979, London followed an independent course with subsidiary labels such as Slash, Pete Tongs Essential Records. The name is used, mainly for UK-based artists. Notable artists released by that incarnation of London, called London Records 90, include New Order, Happy Mondays, A, after PolyGram took over British Decca, classical-music albums recorded by British Decca continued to be released on the London label in the U. S. S. The London pop music catalogue owned by Universal Music is now managed by Polydor Records, Decca Records had a recording studio in Blomfield Road, West London, there may have been another in Londons West End. In 2010, Universal Music reclaimed ownership of the London Records trademark, both had started their careers at London Records in the Ames era in the 1990s. When Nick Raphael became president of Capitol Recordss UK division in 2013, London Records moved there, Arlissa All Saints Arlissa Dear Prudence The Gypsy Queens List of record labels The London Records Story from BSN Pubs Discographies London Records A&R team contact list
5.
Record producer
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A record producer or music producer oversees and manages the sound recording and production of a band or performers music, which may range from recording one song to recording a lengthy concept album. A producer has many roles during the recording process, the roles of a producer vary. The producer may perform these roles himself, or help select the engineer, the producer may also pay session musicians and engineers and ensure that the entire project is completed within the record companies budget. A record producer or music producer has a broad role in overseeing and managing the recording. Producers also often take on an entrepreneurial role, with responsibility for the budget, schedules, contracts. In the 2010s, the industry has two kinds of producers with different roles, executive producer and music producer. Executive producers oversee project finances while music producers oversee the process of recording songs or albums. In most cases the producer is also a competent arranger, composer. The producer will also liaise with the engineer who concentrates on the technical aspects of recording. Noted producer Phil Ek described his role as the person who creatively guides or directs the process of making a record, indeed, in Bollywood music, the designation actually is music director. The music producers job is to create, shape, and mold a piece of music, at the beginning of record industry, producer role was technically limited to record, in one shot, artists performing live. The role of producers changed progressively over the 1950s and 1960s due to technological developments, the development of multitrack recording caused a major change in the recording process. Before multitracking, all the elements of a song had to be performed simultaneously, all of these singers and musicians had to be assembled in a large studio and the performance had to be recorded. As well, for a song that used 20 instruments, it was no longer necessary to get all the players in the studio at the same time. Examples include the rock sound effects of the 1960s, e. g. playing back the sound of recorded instruments backwards or clanging the tape to produce unique sound effects. These new instruments were electric or electronic, and thus they used instrument amplifiers, new technologies like multitracking changed the goal of recording, A producer could blend together multiple takes and edit together different sections to create the desired sound. For example, in jazz fusion Bandleader-composer Miles Davis album Bitches Brew, producers like Phil Spector and George Martin were soon creating recordings that were, in practical terms, almost impossible to realise in live performance. Producers became creative figures in the studio, other examples of such engineers includes Joe Meek, Teo Macero, Brian Wilson, and Biddu
6.
Prospero's Books
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Prosperos Books is a 1991 British avant-garde film adaptation of William Shakespeares The Tempest, written and directed by Peter Greenaway. John Gielgud plays Prospero, the protagonist who provides the off-screen narration, stylistically, Prosperos Books is narratively and cinematically innovative in its techniques, combining mime, dance, opera, and animation. Edited in Japan, the film makes use of digital image manipulation, often overlaying multiple moving. Michael Nyman composed the score and Karine Saporta choreographed the dance. The film is notable for its extensive use of nudity. The nude actors and extras represent a cross-section of male and female humanity, Prosperos Books is a complex tale based upon William Shakespeares The Tempest. In the film, Prospero stands in for Shakespeare himself, and is writing and speaking the storys action as it unfolds. Ariel is played by four actors, three acrobats — a boy, an adolescent, and a youth — and a boy singer, the books of Prospero number 24 according to the production design which outlines each volumes content. The list is reminiscent of the lost books of Epicurus, the film was screened out of competition at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival. This was the last of the collaborations between director Peter Greenaway and composer Michael Nyman, most of the films music cues, are from an earlier concert, La Traversée de Paris and the score from A Zed & Two Noughts. The soundtrack album is Nymans sixteenth release and it is simply a work of original art, which Greenaway asks us to accept or reject on his own terms. Prosperos Books at the Internet Movie Database Prosperos Books at AllMovie
7.
The Hairdresser's Husband
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The Hairdressers Husband, a 1990 French film written by Patrice Leconte and Claude Klotz, and directed by Leconte. Jean Rochefort stars as the title character and it won Patrice Leconte the Prix Louis Delluc. In 1991 it was nominated for Best Foreign-Language Film in the British Academy Film Awards, the film begins in a flashback from the titular character, Antoine. We are introduced to his fixation with female hairdressers which began at a young age, the film uses flashbacks throughout and there are frequent parallels drawn with the past. Though Antoine tells Mathilde that the past is dead, his life is evidence that on some level the past repeats itself. As a young boy he fantasised about a hairdresser who committed suicide, however there are differences, Mathilde commits suicide because she is so happy she is afraid of the happiness she has found with Antoine ending. We are unsure what Antoine has done with his life, we know, however, the reality proves to be every bit as wonderful as the fantasy and the two enjoy an enigmatic, enclosed and enchanting relationship. The final sequence shows Antoine, in the salon, dancing to Eastern music just as he has throughout his life. His last line is the comment that the hairdresser will return. The film was nominated for the Grand Prix of the Belgian Syndicate of Cinema Critics, the Hairdressers Husband was released on DVD by Umbrella Entertainment in April 2011. The DVD is compatible region code 4, the soundtrack was composed by Michael Nyman and also contains a great deal of Middle Eastern popular music. It was first released as an album in Japan by Soundtrack Listeners Communications September 21,1992 and has subsequently been released elsewhere, the Hairdressers Husband at the Internet Movie Database The Hairdressers Husband at AllMovie The Hairdressers Husband at Rotten Tomatoes Review of The Hairdressers Husband
8.
Paul Celan
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Paul Celan was a Romanian-born German language poet and translator. He was born as Paul Antschel to a Jewish family in Cernăuți, in the then Kingdom of Romania and he became one of the major German-language poets of the post-World War II era. Celan was born into a German-speaking Jewish family in Cernăuți, Bukovina and his first home was in the Wassilkogasse in Cernăuți. His father, Leo Antschel, was a Zionist who advocated his sons education in Hebrew at the Jewish school Safah Ivriah, Celans mother, Fritzi, was an avid reader of German literature who insisted German be the language of the house. In his teens Celan became active in Jewish Socialist organizations and fostered support for the Republican cause in the Spanish Civil War and his earliest known poem is titled Mothers Day 1938. In 1934, fourteen-year-old Paul wrote a letter to his aunt Minna in Palestine, in there is the eloquent phrase, With regard to anti-Semitism in our school. Paul attended the Liceul Marele Voievod Mihai, where he studied from 1934 until graduating in 1938, at this time Celan secretly began to write poetry. In 1938 Celan traveled to Tours, France, to study medicine, the Anschluss precluded his study in Vienna, and Romanian schools were harder to get into due to the newly imposed Jewish quota. Celan returned to Cernăuţi in 1939 to study literature and Romance languages, following the Soviet occupation of Bukovina in June 1940 deportations to Siberia started. A year later following the reconquest of Romania, Nazi Germany and the then fascist Romanian regime brought ghettos, internment, on arrival in Cernăuți July 1941 the German SS Einsatzkommando and their Romanian allies set the citys Great Synagogue on fire. In October, the Romanians deported a number of Jews after forcing them into a ghetto. Before the ghetto was dissolved in the fall of that year, Celan was pressed into labor, first clearing the debris of a demolished post office, and then gathering and destroying Russian books. The local mayor strove to mitigate the harsh circumstances, until the governor of Bukovina had the Jews rounded up and deported, Celan hoped to convince his parents to leave the country so as to escape certain persecution. Celans father likely perished of typhus and his mother was shot after being exhausted by forced labour, later that year, after having himself been taken to a labour camp in Romania, Celan would receive reports of his parents deaths. There, he worked briefly as a nurse in the mental hospital, considering emigration to Palestine, Celan left Cernăuţi in 1945 for Bucharest, where he remained until 1947. He was active in the Jewish literary community as both a translator of Russian literature into Romanian, and as a poet, publishing his work under a variety of pseudonyms. Here he also met with the poets Rose Ausländer and Emannuel Weissglas, a version of Celans poem Todesfuge appeared as Tangoul Morţii in a Romanian translation of May 1947. Additional remarks were published explaining that the dancing and musical performances evoked in the poem were images of realities of the camp life
9.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, baptised as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. Born in Salzburg, he showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood, already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty. At 17, Mozart was engaged as a musician at the Salzburg court, while visiting Vienna in 1781, he was dismissed from his Salzburg position. He chose to stay in the capital, where he achieved fame, during his final years in Vienna, he composed many of his best-known symphonies, concertos, and operas, and portions of the Requiem, which was largely unfinished at the time of his death. The circumstances of his death have been much mythologized. He was survived by his wife Constanze and two sons and he composed more than 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral music. He is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers, Ludwig van Beethoven composed his own early works in the shadow of Mozart, and Joseph Haydn wrote, posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born on 27 January 1756 to Leopold Mozart and Anna Maria, née Pertl and this was the capital of the Archbishopric of Salzburg, an ecclesiastic principality in what is now Austria, then part of the Holy Roman Empire. He was the youngest of seven children, five of whom died in infancy and his elder sister was Maria Anna Mozart, nicknamed Nannerl. Mozart was baptized the day after his birth, at St. Ruperts Cathedral in Salzburg, the baptismal record gives his name in Latinized form, as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. He generally called himself Wolfgang Amadè Mozart as an adult, Leopold Mozart, a native of Augsburg, Germany, was a minor composer and an experienced teacher. In 1743, he was appointed as fourth violinist in the establishment of Count Leopold Anton von Firmian. Four years later, he married Anna Maria in Salzburg, Leopold became the orchestras deputy Kapellmeister in 1763. During the year of his sons birth, Leopold published a textbook, Versuch einer gründlichen Violinschule. When Nannerl was 7, she began lessons with her father. Years later, after her brothers death, she reminisced, He often spent much time at the clavier, picking out thirds, which he was ever striking, and his pleasure showed that it sounded good. In the fourth year of his age his father, for a game as it were, began to teach him a few minuets and he could play it faultlessly and with the greatest delicacy, and keeping exactly in time. At the age of five, he was composing little pieces
10.
William Shakespeare
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William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the worlds pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called Englands national poet, and the Bard of Avon and his extant works, including collaborations, consist of approximately 38 plays,154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright, Shakespeare was born and brought up in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children, Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a career in London as an actor, writer. He appears to have retired to Stratford around 1613, at age 49, Shakespeare produced most of his known work between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories, which are regarded as some of the best work ever produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, including Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, in his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies, also known as romances, and collaborated with other playwrights. Many of his plays were published in editions of varying quality and it was prefaced with a poem by Ben Jonson, in which Shakespeare is hailed, presciently, as not of an age, but for all time. In the 20th and 21st centuries, his works have been adapted and rediscovered by new movements in scholarship. His plays remain highly popular and are studied, performed. William Shakespeare was the son of John Shakespeare, an alderman and a successful glover originally from Snitterfield, and Mary Arden and he was born in Stratford-upon-Avon and baptised there on 26 April 1564. His actual date of birth unknown, but is traditionally observed on 23 April. This date, which can be traced back to an 18th-century scholars mistake, has proved appealing to biographers because Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616 and he was the third child of eight and the eldest surviving son. At the age of 18, Shakespeare married 26-year-old Anne Hathaway, the consistory court of the Diocese of Worcester issued a marriage licence on 27 November 1582. The next day, two of Hathaways neighbours posted bonds guaranteeing that no lawful claims impeded the marriage, twins, son Hamnet and daughter Judith, followed almost two years later and were baptised 2 February 1585. Hamnet died of unknown causes at the age of 11 and was buried 11 August 1596, after the birth of the twins, Shakespeare left few historical traces until he is mentioned as part of the London theatre scene in 1592. The exception is the appearance of his name in the bill of a law case before the Queens Bench court at Westminster dated Michaelmas Term 1588 and 9 October 1589
11.
Arthur Rimbaud
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Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud was a French poet who is known for his influence on modern literature and arts, which prefigured surrealism. Rimbaud was known to have been a libertine and for being a restless soul, having engaged in an at times violent romantic relationship with fellow poet Paul Verlaine, which lasted nearly two years. After the end of his career, he traveled extensively on three continents as a merchant before his death from cancer just after his thirty-seventh birthday. As a poet, Rimbaud is well known for his contributions to Symbolism and, among other works, A Season in Hell, Arthur Rimbaud was born in the provincial town of Charleville in the Ardennes département in northeastern France. He was the child of Frédéric Rimbaud and Marie Catherine Vitalie Cuif. Rimbauds father, a Burgundian of Provençal extraction, was an infantry captain risen from the ranks, from 1844 to 1850, he participated in the conquest of Algeria, and in 1854 was awarded the Légion dhonneur by Imperial decree. Captain Rimbaud was described as good-tempered, easy-going and generous, with the long moustaches and goatee of a Chasseur officer. In October 1852, Captain Rimbaud, then aged 38, was transferred to Mézières where he met Vitalie Cuif,11 years his junior and she came from a solidly established Ardennais family, but one with its share of bohemians, two of her brothers were alcoholics. Her personality was the exact opposite of Captain Rimbauds, she was narrowminded, stingy, completely lacking in a sense of humour. When Charles Houin, a biographer, interviewed her, he found her withdrawn. Arthur Rimbauds private name for her was Mouth of Darkness, nevertheless, on 8 February 1853, Captain Rimbaud and Vitalie Cuif married, their first-born, Jean Nicolas Frédéric, arrived nine months later on 2 November. The next year, on 20 October 1854, Jean Nicolas Arthur was born, three more children followed, Victorine-Pauline-Vitalie on 4 June 1857, Jeanne-Rosalie-Vitalie on 15 June 1858 and, finally, Frédérique Marie Isabelle on 1 June 1860. Though the marriage lasted seven years, Captain Rimbaud lived continuously in the home for less than three months, from February to May 1853. The rest of the time his military postings—including active service in the Crimean War and he was not at home for his childrens births, nor their baptisms. Isabelles birth in 1860 must have been the last straw, as after this Captain Rimbaud stopped returning home on leave entirely. Though they never divorced, the separation was complete, thereafter Mme Rimbaud let herself be known as Widow Rimbaud, neither the captain nor his children showed the slightest interest in re-establishing contact. Fearing her children were being over-influenced by the children of the poor. Rimbaud moved her family to the Cours dOrléans in 1862 and this was a better neighbourhood, and the boys, now aged nine and eight, who had been taught at home by their mother, were now sent to the Pension Rossat
12.
Music Sales Group
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Music Sales Group is a European printed music publisher, with headquarters in Berners Street, London. Novello & Co is a London-based printed music publishing company specializing in classical music and it was founded in 1811 by Vincent Novello. Chester Music is a British publisher of printed music specializing in composition and educational music of the 20th. Musicroom is a UK based sheet music, musical instrument and accessory retailer with 16 stores nationwide. In addition to printed music all stores also offer instant access to a virtual stockroom of some 45,000 pieces of music any of which can be printed out in high quality. Music Sales Group consumer website Music Sales Group digital sheet music website Music Sales Group website for music education
13.
Letter (message)
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A letter is a written message from one party to another containing information. Letters promote the preservation of communication between parties, they may bring friends or relatives closer together, enrich professional relationships and provide a means of self-expression. Letters contribute to the protection and conservation of literacy, Letters have been sent since antiquity and are mentioned in the Iliad. Works by both Herodotus and Thucydides also mention letters, historically, letters have existed from the time of ancient India, ancient Egypt and Sumer, through Rome, Greece and China, up to the present day. During the seventeenth and eighteenth century, letters were used to self-educate, Letters were a way to practice critical reading, self-expressive writing, polemical writing and also exchange ideas with like-minded others. For some people, letters were seen as a written performance, for others, it was not only seen as a performance but also as a way of communication and a method of gaining feedback. Letters make up several of the books of the Bible, archives of correspondence, whether for personal, diplomatic, or business reasons, serve as primary sources for historians. At certain times, the writing of letters has risen to be an art form, in the ancient world letters were written on a various different materials, including metal, lead, wax-coated wooden tablets, pottery fragments, animal skin, and papyrus. From Ovid, we learn that Acontius used an apple for his letter to Cydippe, as communication technology has diversified, posted letters have become less important as a routine form of communication. For example, the development of the telegraph drastically shortened the time taken to send a communication, at the telegraph office closest to the destination, the signal was converted back into writing on paper and delivered to the recipient. The next step was the telex which avoided the need for local delivery, then followed the fax machine, a letter could be transferred electrically from the sender to the receiver through the telephone network as an image. Due to the timelessness and universality of letter writing, there is a wealth of letters, the study of letter writing usually involves both the study of rhetoric and grammar. Despite email, letters are still popular, particularly in business, Letters have the following advantages over email, No special device is needed to receive a letter, just a postal address, and the letter can be read immediately on receipt. An advertising mailing can reach every address in a particular area, a letter provides immediate, and in principle permanent, physical record of communication, without the need for printing. A letter in the senders own handwriting is more personal than an email, if required, small physical objects can be enclosed in the envelope with the letter. Letters are unable to transmit malware or other files that can be transmitted by email. Letter writing leads to the mastery of the technique of good writing, letter writing can provide an extension of the face-to-face therapeutic encounter. Here is how a letter gets from the sender to the recipient, Sender writes letter, Sender ensures that the recipients address includes the Zip or Postal Code and often includes his/her return address on the envelope
14.
Riddle
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A riddle is a statement or question or phrase having a double or veiled meaning, put forth as a puzzle to be solved. Defining riddles precisely is hard and has attracted a fair amount of scholarly debate, the first major modern attempt to define the riddle was by Robert Petsch in 1899, with another seminal contribution, inspired by structuralism, by Robert A. Georges and Alan Dundes in 1963. In some traditions and contexts, riddles may overlap with proverbs, an example from a different language, Nothing hurts it, but it groans all the time can be deployed as a proverb or as a riddle. Much academic research on riddles has focused on collecting, cataloguing, defining and typologising riddles, key work on cataloguing and typologising riddles was published by Antti Aarne in 1918-20, and by Archer Taylor. In the case of ancient riddles recorded without solutions, considerable scholarly energy also goes into proposing and debating solutions, however, wide-ranging studies of riddles have tended to be limited to Western countries, with Oriental and African riddles being relatively neglected. Riddles have also attracted linguists, often studying riddles from the point of view of semiotics, the riddle was at times a prominent literary form in the ancient and medieval world, and so riddles are extensively, if patchily, attested in our written records from these periods. According to Archer Taylor, the oldest recorded riddles are Babylonian school texts which show no literary polish and it is clear that we have here riddles from oral tradition that a teacher has put into a schoolbook. It is thought that the worlds earliest surviving poetic riddles survive in the Sanskrit Rigveda, the first book of the Rigveda contains a number of riddles, overlapping in significant part with a collection of forty-seven in the Atharvaveda, riddles also appear elsewhere in Vedic texts. The highly sophisticated quality of many Sanskrit riddles can perhaps be illustrated by one rather simple example. Who makes a noise on seeing a thief, who is the enemy of lotuses. Who is the climax of fury, the answers to the first three questions, when combined in the manner of a charade, yield the answer to the fourth question. The first answer is bird, the dog, the third sun, and the whole is Viçvamitra, Ramas first teacher and counselor. Thus, for example, Daṇḍin cites this as an example of a name-riddle, A city, five letters, the one is a nasal. The Mahabharata also portrays riddle-contests and includes riddles accordingly, the first riddle collection in a medieval Indic language was by Amir Khusro, although he mostly wrote in Persian, he wrote his riddles in the language he called Hindawi. The riddles are in Mātrika metre, one example is, The emboldened text here indicates a clue woven into the text, it is a pun on nadi. While riddles are not numerous in the Bible, they are present, most famously in Samsons riddle in Judges xiv.14, but also in I Kings 10, 1-13, sirach also mentions riddles as a popular dinner pastime. The Aramaic Story of Ahikar contains a section of proverbial wisdom that in some versions also contains riddles. However, under the influence of Arabic literature in medieval al-Andalus, dunash ben Labrat, credited with transposing Arabic metres into Hebrew, composed a number of riddles, mostly apparently inspired by folk-riddles
15.
BBC
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The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. It is headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, the BBC is the worlds oldest national broadcasting organisation and the largest broadcaster in the world by number of employees. It employs over 20,950 staff in total,16,672 of whom are in public sector broadcasting, the total number of staff is 35,402 when part-time, flexible, and fixed contract staff are included. The BBC is established under a Royal Charter and operates under its Agreement with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. The fee is set by the British Government, agreed by Parliament, and used to fund the BBCs radio, TV, britains first live public broadcast from the Marconi factory in Chelmsford took place in June 1920. It was sponsored by the Daily Mails Lord Northcliffe and featured the famous Australian Soprano Dame Nellie Melba, the Melba broadcast caught the peoples imagination and marked a turning point in the British publics attitude to radio. However, this public enthusiasm was not shared in official circles where such broadcasts were held to interfere with important military and civil communications. By late 1920, pressure from these quarters and uneasiness among the staff of the licensing authority, the General Post Office, was sufficient to lead to a ban on further Chelmsford broadcasts. But by 1922, the GPO had received nearly 100 broadcast licence requests, John Reith, a Scottish Calvinist, was appointed its General Manager in December 1922 a few weeks after the company made its first official broadcast. The company was to be financed by a royalty on the sale of BBC wireless receiving sets from approved manufacturers, to this day, the BBC aims to follow the Reithian directive to inform, educate and entertain. The financial arrangements soon proved inadequate, set sales were disappointing as amateurs made their own receivers and listeners bought rival unlicensed sets. By mid-1923, discussions between the GPO and the BBC had become deadlocked and the Postmaster-General commissioned a review of broadcasting by the Sykes Committee and this was to be followed by a simple 10 shillings licence fee with no royalty once the wireless manufactures protection expired. The BBCs broadcasting monopoly was made explicit for the duration of its current broadcast licence, the BBC was also banned from presenting news bulletins before 19.00, and required to source all news from external wire services. Mid-1925 found the future of broadcasting under further consideration, this time by the Crawford committee, by now the BBC under Reiths leadership had forged a consensus favouring a continuation of the unified broadcasting service, but more money was still required to finance rapid expansion. Wireless manufacturers were anxious to exit the loss making consortium with Reith keen that the BBC be seen as a service rather than a commercial enterprise. The recommendations of the Crawford Committee were published in March the following year and were still under consideration by the GPO when the 1926 general strike broke out in May. The strike temporarily interrupted newspaper production and with restrictions on news bulletins waived the BBC suddenly became the source of news for the duration of the crisis. The crisis placed the BBC in a delicate position, the Government was divided on how to handle the BBC but ended up trusting Reith, whose opposition to the strike mirrored the PMs own
16.
Letters, Riddles and Writs
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Letters, Riddles and Writs is a one act opera for television by Michael Nyman. The opera premiered on the BBC television miniseries, Not Mozart, directed by Newson, ute Lemper played the role of Mozart. This section of the opera is an opera buffa-style interlude, the majority of the opera is more serious. Extracts of the opera are featured on The Michael Nyman Songbook, the film also features David Thomas as Leopold Mozart and Tony Rohr as Ludwig van Beethoven. Letters, Riddles and Writs at the Internet Movie Database
17.
Ariel (The Tempest)
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Ariel /ˈæriəl/ is a spirit who appears in William Shakespeares play The Tempest. Ariel is bound to serve the magician Prospero, who rescued him from the tree in which he was imprisoned by Sycorax, Prospero greets disobedience with a reminder that he saved Ariel from Sycoraxs spell, and with promises to grant Ariel his freedom. The source of Ariels name and character is unknown, although critics have pointed out his similarities to the Ariel mentioned in Isaiah chapter 29 in the Bible. The name means Lion of God, in this sense, Ariel may also be a simple play on the word aerial. Since the stage directions in The Tempest are so precise, critics, also, a line by Ariel in Act IV brings other scholars to ask questions as to whether the original actor for Ariel played the part for Ceres as well, due to a shortage of boy actors. Ariel is widely viewed as a character, although this view has wavered over the years, especially in the Restoration. Whenever Caliban desired not to obey the command of Prospero, Ariel would persuade him to do the work, either by using magical powers or by using force. Ariel first appears in the scene of the play to report to Prospero on his success in carrying out his command to shipwreck the King of Naples. Ariel adds that, as commanded, he saw none of the group were harmed. After being praised by Prospero, Ariel pleads for his freedom from the service in return. Prospero declines, reminding him of the state he was in before Prospero rescued him, after 12 years of pain, Ariel was released from his prison by Prospero, who pressed the spirit into his service. The magician denies Ariels request for freedom at this time, but promises that on the condition he follows the rest of his commands, he will grant his wish in two days. For the rest of the play, Ariel is Prosperos eyes and ears—spying on the sailors in invisible form. In the second act Ariel briefly appears to stop a conspiracy to kill Alonso, King of Naples, whose brother, Sebastian, Ariel sings in the ear of Gonzalo, a councillor to Alonso, to wake him and foils the plot. Ariel also appears in Act Three to foil Calibans plot to turn the sailors against Prospero and murder him. Later in the act, he appears with a clap of thunder and rebukes those who were involved in the plot to banish Prospero to the island. He is later called on to gather the spirits of the island before Miranda and Ferdinand, and to bring Trinculo, Stephano, in the final act, Ariel releases the prisoners of Prospero and awakens what is left of the crew of the ship from a deep slumber. Thanks to Ariels work, Ferdinand and Miranda have fallen in love, Prospero is so impressed by Ariels matchmaking that he says that he would set Ariel free for that one act
18.
The Tempest
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The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on an island, where the sorcerer Prospero, rightful Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place using illusion. He conjures up a storm, the eponymous tempest, to lure his usurping brother Antonio, there, his machinations bring about the revelation of Antonios lowly nature, the redemption of the King, and the marriage of Miranda to Alonsos son, Ferdinand. In addition, one of Gonzalos speeches is derived from Montaignes essay Of the Canibales, the masque in Act 4 may have been a later addition, possibly in honour of the wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Frederick V in 1613. The play was first published in the First Folio of 1623, the story draws heavily on the tradition of the romance, and it was influenced by tragicomedy, the courtly masque and perhaps the commedia dellarte. It differs from Shakespeares other plays in its observation of a stricter, H. Gonzalo, Alonsos counselor, had secretly supplied their boat with some food, fresh water, rich garments, linens, stuffs and necessaries, and volumes that Prospero prizes. Prospero maintains Ariels loyalty by promising to release the airy spirit from servitude. Sycorax had been exiled from Algiers to the island for wreaking havoc with her magic, Sycorax son, Caliban, a deformed monster and the only non-spiritual inhabitant before the arrival of Prospero, was initially adopted and raised by him. He taught Prospero how to survive on the island, while Prospero and Miranda taught Caliban religion, in slavery, Caliban has come to view Prospero as a usurper and has grown to resent him and his daughter. Prospero and Miranda in turn view Caliban with disappointment, contempt, Prospero only performs one act of magic himself directly on stage, he disarms Ferdinand, causing his nerves to become in their infancy again. The rest of his magic is through controlling spirits, which is how magicians of the time were believed to operate, Prospero, having divined that his brother Antonio is on a nearby ship, has raised a tempest that causes the passengers to believe they are shipwrecked and marooned. Also on the ship are Antonios friend and fellow conspirator, King Alonso of Naples, Alonsos brother and son and Alonsos trusted counselor, all these passengers are returning from the wedding of Alonsos daughter Claribel and the King of Tunis. Prospero contrives to separate the shipwreck survivors into several groups by his spells, three plots then alternate through the play. In one, Caliban falls in with Stephano and Trinculo, two drunkards, believing Stephano to be a god who bears celestial liquor. They attempt to raise a coup against Prospero, which ultimately fails, in the third subplot, Antonio and Sebastian conspire to kill Alonso and Gonzalo so that Sebastian can become King. Ariel thwarts them, at Prosperos command, Ariel appears to the three men of sin as a harpy, reprimanding them for their betrayal of Prospero. Prospero, who has witnessed this, leaves to visit Ferdinand, the three guilty nobles run off, distracted and in a frenzy, and Gonzalo and the attendant lords chase after to prevent them from doing what this ecstasy may now provoke them to. Prospero then explains that he tested Ferdinand, and betroths a willing Miranda to him and he then asks Ariel to bring some other spirits and create a masque to entertain the young couple
19.
Mazurka
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The mazurka is a Polish folk dance in triple meter, usually at a lively tempo, and with strong accents unsystematically placed on the second or third beat. The folk origins of the mazurek are two other Polish musical forms which are the slow kujawiak, and the fast oberek, the mazurek is always found to have either a triplet, trill, dotted eighth note pair, or an ordinary eighth note pair before two quarter notes. In the 19th century, the dance became popular in many ballrooms in different parts of Europe, the Polish national anthem has a mazurek rhythm but is too slow to be considered a mazurek. In Polish, mazurka is actually the genitive and accusative cases of mazurek, several classical composers have written mazurkas, with the best known being the 69 composed by Frédéric Chopin for solo piano. In 1825 Maria Szymanowska wrote the largest collection of piano mazurkas published before Chopin, Chopin first started composing mazurkas in 1825, but his composing did not become serious until 1830, the year of the November Uprising, a Polish rebellion against the Russian Tsar. Chopin continued composing them until 1849, the year of his death, the stylistic and musical characteristics of Chopins mazurkas differ from the traditional variety because Chopin in effect created a completely separate and new genre of mazurka all his own. For example, he used techniques in his mazurkas, including counterpoint. By including more chromaticism and harmony in the mazurkas, he made them more interesting than the traditional dances. Chopin also tried to compose his mazurkas in such a way that they could not be used for dancing, however, while Chopin changed some aspects of the original mazurka, he maintained others. His mazurkas, like the traditional dances, contain a great deal of repetition, repetition of certain measures or groups of measures, of entire sections, the rhythm of his mazurkas also remains very similar to that of earlier mazurkas. This use of rhythm suggests that Chopin tried to create a genre that had ties to the original form, the dance was common as a popular dance in Europe and the United States in the mid- to late nineteenth century. In Cape Verde the mazurka is also revered as an important cultural phenomenon played with bands led by a violinist. It also takes a variation of the dance form and is found mostly in the north of the archipelago, mainly in São Nicolau. In the south it finds popularity in the island of Brava, czech composers Bedřich Smetana, Antonín Dvořák, and Bohuslav Martinů all wrote mazurkas to at least some extent. For Smetana and Martinů, these are single pieces, whereas Dvořák composed a set of six mazurkas for piano, and in 1991 Albert Hyden performed a sonet for the president called alpha Q. In France, Impressionistic composers Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel both wrote mazurkas, Debussys is a piece, and Ravels is part of a suite of an early work. Jacques Offenbach included a mazurka in his ballet Gaîté Parisienne, Léo Delibes composed one which appears several times in the first act of his ballet Coppélia, the mazurka appears frequently in French traditional folk music. In the French Antilles, the mazurka has become an important style of dance, a creolised version of the mazurka is mazouk, which was introduced to the French Caribbean during the 19th century
20.
Shakespeare
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William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the worlds pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called Englands national poet, and the Bard of Avon and his extant works, including collaborations, consist of approximately 38 plays,154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright, Shakespeare was born and brought up in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children, Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a career in London as an actor, writer. He appears to have retired to Stratford around 1613, at age 49, Shakespeare produced most of his known work between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories, which are regarded as some of the best work ever produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, including Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, in his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies, also known as romances, and collaborated with other playwrights. Many of his plays were published in editions of varying quality and it was prefaced with a poem by Ben Jonson, in which Shakespeare is hailed, presciently, as not of an age, but for all time. In the 20th and 21st centuries, his works have been adapted and rediscovered by new movements in scholarship. His plays remain highly popular and are studied, performed. William Shakespeare was the son of John Shakespeare, an alderman and a successful glover originally from Snitterfield, and Mary Arden and he was born in Stratford-upon-Avon and baptised there on 26 April 1564. His actual date of birth unknown, but is traditionally observed on 23 April. This date, which can be traced back to an 18th-century scholars mistake, has proved appealing to biographers because Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616 and he was the third child of eight and the eldest surviving son. At the age of 18, Shakespeare married 26-year-old Anne Hathaway, the consistory court of the Diocese of Worcester issued a marriage licence on 27 November 1582. The next day, two of Hathaways neighbours posted bonds guaranteeing that no lawful claims impeded the marriage, twins, son Hamnet and daughter Judith, followed almost two years later and were baptised 2 February 1585. Hamnet died of unknown causes at the age of 11 and was buried 11 August 1596, after the birth of the twins, Shakespeare left few historical traces until he is mentioned as part of the London theatre scene in 1592. The exception is the appearance of his name in the bill of a law case before the Queens Bench court at Westminster dated Michaelmas Term 1588 and 9 October 1589
21.
John Harle
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John Harle is an English saxophonist, composer, educator and record producer. He is an Ivor Novello Award winner and has been the recipient of two Royal Television Society awards. Following his education at the Royal College of Music in London and in Paris with Daniel Deffayet as a French Government Music Scholar, in his early years, he was a member of the band of composer Michael Nyman and orchestrator for film composer Stanley Myers. Expanding from there into scoring for film and television, in the 1990s, he began a career as saxophonist and composer, both artistically and commercially. He was artistic advisor to Sir Paul McCartney for six years, in addition to his own prolific recording, Harle has contributed directly or indirectly to a number of charting songs and albums by others. A jingle he wrote for Nissan in 1993 became the basis of a pop single by Jazzie B. He contributed to the charting albums Terror and Magnificence by Elvis Costello and Sarah Leonard, Harle has also been an educator, serving at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London in the late 1980s as a professor of Saxophone and Chamber Music. He is currently Visiting Professor of Saxophone at the Guildhall School and it also won the 2013 British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors Ivor Novello Award for Best Television Soundtrack. In October 2013 Harle talked on BBC Radio 3s In Tune programme about his recently-released album Art Music, Harle appeared with Marc Almond on the BBCs Front Row radio programme in February 2014 to discuss their collaborative work about Gothic London, The Tyburn Tree. Harle was a guest on the programme in November of that year, to mark the bicentenary of the birth of Adolphe Sax by assessing the contribution of Saxs invention. Harle has written a book on the saxophone, published by Faber Music which is to be released in February 2017. Harle has two sons, writer/curator Dr. Matthew Harle and Columbia Records composer/producer Danny L Harle, official website of John Harle John Harles homepage at Chester Music
22.
Abbey Road Studios
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Abbey Road Studios is a recording studio at 3 Abbey Road, St Johns Wood, City of Westminster, London, England. It was established November 1931 by the Gramophone Company, a predecessor of British music company EMI, Abbey Road Studios is most notable as being the 1960s venue for innovative recording techniques adopted by the Beatles, Pink Floyd, the Hollies, Badfinger and others. One of its earliest world-famous-artist clients was Paul Robeson, who recorded December 1931, towards the end of 2009, the studio came under threat of sale to property developers. However, the British Government protected the site, granting it English Heritage Grade II listed status in 2010, originally a nine-bedroom Georgian townhouse built in 1831 on the footpath leading to Kilburn Abbey, the building was later converted to flats where the most flamboyant resident was Maundy Gregory. In 1931, the Gramophone Company acquired the premises and converted it into studios, pathé filmed the opening of the studios when Sir Edward Elgar conducted the London Symphony Orchestra in recording sessions of his music. In 1934, inventor of stereo sound, Alan Blumlein, recorded Mozarts Jupiter Symphony which was conducted by Sir Thomas Beecham at the studios, the neighbouring house is also owned by the studio and used to house musicians. During the mid-20th century, the studio was used by leading British conductor Sir Malcolm Sargent. The Gramophone Company amalgamated with Columbia Graphophone Company to form EMI and it was under this name that in 1936 cellist Pablo Casals became the first to record Johann Sebastian Bachs Cello Suites No.1 &2 at the command of EMI head Fred Gaisberg. The recordings went on to spur a revolution among Bach aficionados, in 1958, Studio Two at Abbey Road became a centre for rock and roll music when Cliff Richard and the Drifters recorded Move It there, and later pop music material. The Beatles named their 1969 album Abbey Road, after the street where the studio is located, the studio was renamed Abbey Road Studios in 1970 after the Beatles album had made it famous. Iain Macmillan took the cover photograph outside the studios, with the result that the nearby zebra crossing has become a place of pilgrimage for Beatles fans. It has been a tradition for visitors to pay homage to the band by writing on the wall in front of the even though it is painted over every three months. December 2010, the crossing at Abbey Road was given a Grade II listed status. Pink Floyd recorded most of their late 1960s to mid-1970s albums here, the Shadows named their Live at Abbey Road album after the studio, with the cover spoofing the Beatles album. The chief mastering engineer at Abbey Road was Chris Vinyl Blair, in 1979, EMI commissioned the British jazz fusion band Morrissey-Mullen to record Britains first digitally recorded single record at Abbey Road Studios. From July 18 to September 11,1983, the public had an opportunity to see inside the legendary Studio Two where The Beatles made most of their records. While a new mixing console was being installed in the control room, the soundtrack to the video had a number of recordings that were not made commercially available until the release of The Beatles Anthology project over a decade later. The Red Hot Chili Peppers used a photograph of the walking across the zebra crossing naked on the front of The Abbey Road E. P. which was released in 1988
23.
Alain Resnais
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Alain Resnais was a French film director and screenwriter whose career extended over more than six decades. After training as an editor in the mid-1940s, he went on to direct a number of short films which included Night and Fog. These films were contemporary with, and associated with, the French New Wave and he had closer links to the Left Bank group of authors and filmmakers who shared a commitment to modernism and an interest in left-wing politics. This led to adaptations of plays by Alan Ayckbourn, Henri Bernstein and Jean Anouilh. His films frequently explore the relationship between consciousness, memory, and the imagination, and he was noted for devising innovative formal structures for his narratives, throughout his career, he won many awards from international film festivals and academies. Resnais was born in 1922 at Vannes in Brittany, where his father was a pharmacist, an only child, he was often ill with asthma in childhood, which led to his being withdrawn from school and educated at home. He was a reader, in a range that extended from classics to comic books. For his twelfth birthday his parents gave him a Kodak 8mm camera with which he began to make his own short films, around the age of 14, he discovered surrealism and through that an interest in the works of André Breton. Visits to the theatre in Paris gave Resnais the desire to be an actor, from 1940 to 1942 he studied acting in the Cours René-Simon, but he then decided in 1943 to apply to the newly formed film school IDHEC to study film editing. The film-maker Jean Grémillon was one of the teachers who had the most influence on him at that period and he returned to Paris in 1946 to start his career as a film editor, but also began making short films of his own. Finding himself to be a neighbour of the actor Gérard Philipe, he persuaded him to appear in a 16mm surrealist short, a more ambitious feature-length work, Ouvert pour cause dinventaire, has also vanished without trace. He filmed it at first in 16mm, but when the producer Pierre Braunberger saw the results, van Gogh received a prize at the Venice Biennale in 1948, and also won an Oscar for Best 2-reel Short in 1949. Nuit et Brouillard was one of the first documentaries about the Nazi concentration camps, the accompanying narration was intentionally understated to add to the distancing effect. Although the film encountered problems with the French government, its impact was immense. In 1958 Resnais undertook a commission from the Pechiney company to make short film, in colour and wide-screen, extolling the merits of plastics, poetry was brought to the project, literally, by Raymond Queneau who wrote the narration for the film in rhyming couplets. Similar collaborations underpinned his work in feature films. Resnaiss first feature film was Hiroshima mon amour, in the film, the themes of memory and forgetting are explored via new narrative techniques which balance images with narrated text and ignore conventional notions of plot and story development. The film was shown at the 1959 Cannes Film Festival, alongside Truffauts Les Quatre Cents Coups, Resnaiss next film was LAnnée dernière à Marienbad, which he made in collaboration with the novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet
24.
Night and Fog (1956 film)
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Night and Fog is a 1956 French documentary short film. Directed by Alain Resnais, it was ten years after the liberation of Nazi concentration camps. The title is taken from the notorious Nacht und Nebel program of forced abductions, the documentary features the abandoned grounds of Auschwitz and Majdanek while describing the lives of prisoners in the camps. Night and Fog was made in collaboration with scriptwriter Jean Cayrol, the music of the soundtrack was composed by Hanns Eisler. Resnais was originally hesitant about making the film and refused the offer to make it until Cayrol was contracted to write the script, the film was shot entirely in the year 1955 and is composed of contemporary shots of the camps, plus stock footage. Resnais and Cayrol found the very difficult to make due to its graphic nature. Night and Fog was released to acclaim, and still receives very high praise today. It was re-shown on French television nationwide in 1990, to remind the people of the horrors of war, Night and Fog is a documentary that alternates between past and present, using both black-and-white and color footage. The first part of Night and Fog shows remnants of Auschwitz while the narrator Michel Bouquet describes the rise of Nazi ideology, the film continues with comparisons of the life of the Schutzstaffel to the starving prisoners in the camps. Bouquet then addresses the sadism inflicted upon the inmates, including torture, scientific and medical experiments, executions. The next section is completely in black-and-white, and depicts images of gas chambers. The final topic of the film depicts the liberation of the country, the discovery of the horror of the camps, from 1954 to 1955, a number of activities took place observing the tenth anniversary of the liberation of France and of the concentration camps. One of these was an exhibition curated by Olga Wormser and Henri Michel, Resistance, Liberation, Deportation, the exhibit was based on Michel and Wormsers monograph which had appeared earlier in 1954 in a special issue of Revue dhistoire de la Deuxième Guerre mondiale. The first public notice of a film project was given during a radio broadcast on 10 November 1954. Michel recognized that this approach would enable broader financing, and both re-envisioned the film as communicating historical research through contemporary media, initially, Michel thought the film could take the form of a montage of news reports. The genocide of the Jews was treated in French remembrance as more of a side issue—something that was in any case supposedly a matter for the Jews themselves and not for the majority of society. Michel and Wormser might have wanted scholarly objectivity instead of the heroism favoured by the deportees association. Film producers Anatole Dauman, Samy Halfton and Philippe Lifchitz were invited to this exhibit and felt that a film should be made on the subject. Anatole Dauman, originally from Warsaw, undertook the production for Argos Films and arranged for co-financing by Films Polski, Dauman approached filmmaker Alain Resnais who had experience with documentary films since 1948
25.
Alexander Dovzhenko
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Alexander Petrovich Dovzhenko or Oleksandr Petrovych Dovzhenko, was a Soviet screenwriter, film producer and director of Ukrainian origin. He is often cited as one of the most important early Soviet filmmakers, alongside Sergei Eisenstein, Dziga Vertov, Alexander Dovzhenko was born in the hamlet of Viunyshche located in Chernigov Governorate, Russian Empire, to Petro Semenovych Dovzhenko and Odarka Yermolayivna Dovzhenko. His paternal ancestors were Ukrainian Cossacks who settled in Sosnytsia in the eighteenth century, Alexander was the seventh of fourteen children, but due to the horrific rate of child loss he became the oldest child by the time he turned eleven. Although his parents were uneducated, Dovzhenkos semi-literate grandfather encouraged him to study and he escaped military service during World War I because of a heart condition, but during the Soviet-Ukrainian War he served a year in the Red Army. In 1919 in Zhytomyr he was taken prisoner and sent to a concentration camp, in 1920 Dovzhenko joined the Borotbist party. He served as an assistant to the Ambassador in Warsaw as well as Berlin, upon his return to USSR in 1923, he began illustrating books and drawing cartoons in Kharkiv. Dovzhenko turned to film in 1926 when he landed in Odessa and his ambitious drive led to the production of his second-ever screenplay, Vasya the Reformer. He gained greater success with Zvenyhora in 1928 which established him as a filmmaker of his era. His following Ukraine Trilogy, although underappreciated by some contemporary Soviet critics, is his most well-known work in the West, for his film Shchors, Dovzhenko was awarded the Stalin Prize, eight years later, in 1949, he was awarded another Stalin Prize for his film Michurin. After spending several years writing, co-writing and producing films at Mosfilm Studios in Moscow, over a 20-year career, Dovzhenko personally directed only 7 films. He was a mentor to the young Soviet filmmakers Larisa Shepitko, Dovzhenko died of a heart attack on November 25,1956 in his dacha in Peredelkino. His wife, Yulia Solntseva, continued his legacy by producing films of her own, the Dovzhenko Film Studios in Kiev were named after him in his honour following his death. Alexandr Dovzhenko, The Poet as Filmmaker, MIT Press, in the Service of the State, The Cinema of Alexandr Dovzhenko, University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 0-299-10680-2 Liber, George O. Alexander Dovzhenko, A Life in Soviet Film, preface to Special Issue, The Cinema of Alexander Dovzhenko. Perez, Gilberto Material Ghost, Films and Their Medium, Johns Hopkins University Press, ISBN 0-8018-6523-9 Abramiuk, Larissa The Ukrainian Baroque in Oleksandr Dovzhenkos Cinematic Art, The Ohio State University
26.
Earth (1930 film)
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Earth is a 1930 Soviet silent film by Ukrainian director Alexander Dovzhenko, concerning the process of collectivization and the hostility of Kulak landowners. It is Part 3 of Dovzhenkos Ukraine Trilogy, Earth is regarded as Dovzhenkos masterpiece. The film begins with the moments of grandfather Semyon Opanas beneath a pear tree. Later, Vasyl arrives with the communitys first tractor to much excitement, after the men urinate in the overheated radiator, the peasants plow the land with the tractor and harvest the grain. A montage sequence presents the production of bread from beginning to end and that night Vasyl dances a hopak along a path on his way home, but a dark figure attacks and kills him. Vasyls father turns away the priest who expects to lead the funeral and he asks Vasyls friends to bury his son in a new way without priests and sing new songs for a new life. The villagers do so, while Vasyls fiancee, Natalya, mourns him painfully, at the cemetery, Bilokins son Khoma arrives in a frenzy to declare that he will resist collectivization and that he was the one who killed Vasyl, but the villagers pay him no attention. One declares that Vasyls glory will fly around the world like a new communist airplane, the film ends with a downpour of rain over fruit and vegetables. In 1906 the Tzar had allowed peasants to own private land, after the Russian Revolution in 1917, these peasants in Ukraine wanted to keep their family land and farms and the Soviet government tolerated them. After the grain shortages in the late 1920s, Joseph Stalin decided that it was necessary to eliminate rural capitalism in these regions, Stalin stated We must smash the Kulaks, eliminate them as a class. Some of the land owning peasants fought back and began to sabotage agricultural machines, the local Kulaks were more militant and committed violent acts against Soviet officials. Most Ukrainians wanted to keep their land, especially since compared to many other parts of Russia their land was agriculturally rich. He based the character of Semyon on his own grandfather and the murder of Vasyl on the assassination of a Soviet agent by Kulaks in his own home district. This was Dovzhenkos first film with Kiev Studios after having impressed both critics and the Soviet government with his first two films and he once again used cinematographer and collaborator Danylo Demutsky on this film. Dovzhenko later adapted the film into a novelization and published the completed scenario in 1952, in Ukrainian and Russian, the title Zemlia translates to earth in the sense of soil, land or ground. Earth was simultaneously lauded and derided by Soviet authorities due to its fairly ambiguous political message on such a political subject. It first premiered in Kharkiv, Ukraine in the spring of 1930 during an event held to honor the local Dovzhenko, the film was an immense success and received a standing ovation. This was the occasion during its initial release that Earth was praised
