by Peter Cates

George F. Handel

German composer George Frederick Handel (1685-1759) was known for his love of food. When he once went to a cafe, he ordered three plates of the house special. The waiter inquired politely if the other two plates should be kept warm until his guests arrived.

Handel replied, “No, bring them also; I am those guests.”

The composer’s Largo from his opera Xerxes, the Messiah and the Water Music are considered by many Handel’s most popular works for good reasons; they are beautiful music with melodies that stay in the memory.

In Thornton Wilder’s play Our Town which celebrates small town life during the early 1900s, newspaper editor Webb comments that there’s not that much culture in the village except for Robinson Crusoe, Whistler’s Mother and Handel’s Largo.

Enrico Caruso

Enrico Caruso (1873-1921), John McCormack (1884-1945) and Evan Williams (1867-1918) were Victor’s three tenors whose records sold in the millions. Caruso not only had phenomenal vocal control and musicianship but also an enthusiasm for making records and a shrewd business sense of their potential for profit, despite the primitive sound. And, unlike others, he had a voice that recorded well, as did McCormack and Williams.

Caruso’s widow Dorothy was 20 years younger than her husband, outlived him by 34 years and wrote two biographies about him.

Ray Donovan

Showtime Anytime is the channel for my current favorite TV show, Ray Donovan, starring Liev Schreiber in the title role as a problem solver for the rich and famous in Hollywood. Among the supporting cast is Jon Voight as Ray’s father Mickey, a Boston gangster who consistently messes up the lives of anyone he comes into contact with.

I am presently immersed in its fourth of seven seasons. Highly recommended first class suspense.

 

 

 

 

by Peter Cates

Poet Leo Connellan

Poet Leo Connellan (1928-2001) was born in Portland, grew up in Rockland, lived in Greenwich Village, New York City, during the late ‘50s as part of the generation of beat poets and, upon moving to Connecticut during his later years as a college professor, became recognized as a poet laureate .

He saw the encouragement of young poets showing talent in his classes as his mission in life.

His own poems achieved renown for their simplicity of theme and celebration of daily life among regular folks.

Blueberry Boy draws on his own childhood memories and his Aunt Madge who was a beloved maternal figure after the death of his mother when he was 8 years old, and who made the best blueberry muffins this side of Heaven. The poem also conveys his own goal as a writer to take the special moments of the life experience that suddenly happen and then disappear and give them some permanence on paper:

“I only wish I could have it just once more, you go back and the place looks dull and small in its mosquito biting green.
I was a Blueberry boy in that childhood,
the sun would flush my freckles out
from where winter hid them in the
sallow pale color of snow and I would
run the meadow for blueberries that
my aunt Madge would turn into muffins
I have longed for down the tripup of manhood.
Just a minute again, on my knees, picking
frantically with expectant watered tongue,
ignorant of what lay out of the woods.”

Anton Bruckner

A masterful Symphony that celebrates nature is the 4th of German composer Anton Bruckner (1824-1896) and numerous performances of it abound on YouTube.

One in particular is an October 22, 1951, broadcast of the Vienna Philhar­monic under Wilhelm Furtwangler (1886-1954).

Despite the primitive sound, it is a performance that breathes with life as only Furtwangler’s interpretive genius could convey. Somebody commented that the piece sounded as if it were sung by voices instead of played by instruments.

 

 

 

by Peter Cates

Eleanor Sterling

The 1987 anthology Maine Speaks contains the short story “Whale!” by Eleanor Sterling, originally published in 1974 as part of a Yankee Magazine collection. It depicts, as the author beautifully puts it in her opening paragraph, the following situation:

“On an afternoon in mid-August, a very large gray whale appeared up out of Casco Bay and swam between the rock ledges off Harpswell Island, scattering the perched seagulls to the winds, and washed ashore finally in little Dingley Cove; there it lay on its side like a stone half in and half out of the water, blowing lazily and dreamily through the opening in its head.”

This paragraph is not just good writing; it’s very good writing. It quietly, almost unobtrusively, sets the scene for a momentous event in this bucolic location on the Maine inlet waterway.

The second paragraph then lists the floating trash that had wound up on the cove in the past…”strips of old linoleum, spars, wooden crates and kegs, broken lobster pots, buoy markers, plastic beach bottles, dead fish of all kinds, and once even a dead seal pup all fat and spotted, but never before a whale.” The Coast Guard’s already on its way along with most of the Harpswell citizens.

The story then shifts gears to the point of view of a little boy Willan, whose family has lived on the island for generations and whose own personality is one of “laconic” reserve as were his ancestors and so many New England Yankees such as former President Calvin Coolidge. But, as was Calvin, he is observant and curious about everything and is already soaking in a lot of information through reading, overhearing conversations and asking his Mam lots of questions, most of which she answers endearingly and affectionately.

We find out that Mam is Willan’s guardian since his mother died the previous year, that she owns the Island’s only diner and that Willan helps her with picking blueberries for baking pies to sell and with other chores.

Meanwhile as the gray whale is in its death throes, a baby calf emerges from the side crying for its mother. Willan is suddenly thrown back to the painful memories of when his own mother died and is fearful something terrible will happen to the calf if it sticks around trying to arouse its mother. Willan was with his mother when she died and empathizes with the calf’s desire to stay with its mother but knows it too must leave for its own survival, as Willan had to go live with Mam.

The brief biography of Sterling in Maine Speaks mentions she was born in 1937 in New York City, moved to Maine in 1961 as a wife of a Bowdoin College professor, wrote about Maine people and happenings for the former Brunswick Record and, as of 1987, had moved just north of San Francisco, California, where she and her husband bought a farm, growing grapes for wine and raising German shepherds for physically challenged people.

I have not been able to glean any information on her whereabouts since then.

In July 2020, a woman was mauled and killed by a Great White Shark while swimming 20 yards from shore on Bailey’s Island in Harpswell. It was the first such fatality in the island’s history.

by Peter Cates

Charles Durning

A select number of actors and actresses could enhance mediocre films and television shows with their contributions; in vehicles worthy of their talents, the nominations for Oscars and Emmys came pouring in.

Those no longer living (excluding the obvious superstars) would include Max von Sydow, George Sanders, Robert Ryan, Jo Van Fleet, Susan Hayward, Lee J. Cobb, Ray Collins, Agnes Moorehead, Judith Anderson, Everett Sloane, Martin Balsam, Alastair Sims, Jeannette Nolan, etc. (Those still living will be saved for another day.).

I add Charles Durning (1923-2012) and give a brief summary of his background.

When he served during World War II, his unit was part of the D-Day invasion, at Omaha Beach, and all of its members were killed except for Durning, who was severely wounded. A few months later, he recovered and fought in the Battle of the Bulge. He was awarded several medals for bravery under fire and would be a popular speaker at Memorial Day and 4th of July commemorations.

While working as an usher in 1951 at a Boston burlesque theater, he was asked to replace a drunken actor on stage, thus beginning a part time career in mostly minor roles in such plays, until the famed Shakespeare-in-the-Park producer Joe Papp saw him and liked what he saw.

Work on stage and in films and television began pouring in more often.

I jump ahead to my first experience of Durning in the mid-’70s Burt Reynolds film Starting Over, as the brother-in-law of Burt’s character. Durning brought an understated reserve in his performance that drew attention away from Reynolds and his leading lady Jill Clayburgh.

Next would be Durning’s appearance in the early ‘80s TV film Night of the Scarecrow as the leader in the lynching of an innocent, educationally-challenged man under wrongful suspicion in a rape case and dressing his corpse up as a scarecrow.

The scarecrow becomes a night of the living dead creature and members of Durning’s lynch mob start mysteriously turning up dead. He worries, but not enough, and is home by himself after dark watching television in his recliner when he starts hearing shuffling noises in the dining room.

The choreography of his leaping out of the recliner and skating all over the floor before he’s executed by the scarecrow was absolutely hilarious.

Other notable roles:

Durning’s one man show on a Boston University stage as baseball legend Casey Stengel, which was hosted by the legendary actor George C. Scott in the audience and televised live on National Public Television.

His role as the sadistic warden in 1987’s HBO miniseries The Man Who Broke 1000 Chains.

His appearance as a governor of Mississippi in the Coen brothers O Brother Where Art Thou; the manner in which Durning stared at stupid sycophantic underlings is worth the viewing.

A guest appearance on a 2004 NCIS episode as a shell-shocked World War II veteran undergoing flashbacks.

In a Parade magazine interview, Durning stated the following about acting:

“There are many secrets in us, in the depths of our souls, that we don’t want anyone to know about. There’s terror and repulsion in us, the terrible spot that we don’t talk about. The place that no one knows about – horrifying things we keep secret. A lot of that is released through acting.”

Charles Durning died from natural causes in 2012 at the age of 89. The New York Times paid tribute to him and Jack Klugman as “extraordinary actors ennobling the ordinary.”

by Peter Cates

Dorothy Maynor

African-American soprano Dorothy Maynor (1910-1996) sang at the inauguration of Harry S Truman in 1948 and Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953; however, while singing frequently in concert and on radio and recordings, she was never invited to the Metropolitan Opera during her peak years.

In 1964, she founded the Harlem School of the Arts, which provided low cost music education to African-American students, and served as director for many years. Its enrollment had gone up to 1,100 students by the time she retired in 1979. Interestingly, while the Metropolitan Opera would never engage her due to prevailing racism in earlier decades, she was invited in 1975 to become the first African-American to serve on its board of directors.

A 1950 78 rpm set of three 12-inch discs, Sacred Songs (RCA Victor Red Seal M 1043), features arias by Bach, Handel, Mozart and Mendelssohn in which her uniquely warm, very heartfelt soprano voice is a special pleasure. Unfortunately, only a couple of the selections from this album are available on YouTube but there is a sizable number of others and, in time, somebody may post the other four sides.

Last Man Standing

I recently finished watching all 9 seasons of the comedy show Last Man Standing, starring the incredibly gifted cast of Tim Allen, Nancy Travis, Hector Elizondo, Jay Leno, Amanda Fuller, Molly Ephraim, Kaitlyn Dever, etc. Even the facial expressions and body movements were distinguished by brilliant timing, as well as the dialog and constant insults and repartee.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

The Maine poet Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) was born in Rockland and spent her adolescence in Camden.

After graduation from Vassar College, she found her way to Greenwich Village and published books of her poems, achieving fame and being awarded a Pulitzer Prize.

Although, and very unfortunately, little read today, her writing had a particularly extraordinary power and eloquence, as seen in the closing stanza from Renascence:

“The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky,-
No higher than the soul is high.
The heart can push the sea and land
Farther away on either hand;
The soul can split the sky in two,
And let the face of God shine through.
But East and West will pinch the heart
That cannot keep them pushed apart;
And he whose soul is flat-the sky
Will cave in on him by and by.”