Lili Boulanger: Sous Bois (1911)

Lili Boulanger's life was tragically cut short at age 24 by contracting bronchial pneumonia which progressed via immune suppression to intestinal tuberculosis. Her post-Romantic musical style was more symbolic than impressionistic, featuring thematic obscurantism, unresolved 7th and 9th chords in the style of Debussy, inclusion of modal and parallel chordal progressions, etc. The end product is forlorn, somewhat alienated 20th century aural landscape which Boulanger supplemented by reference to equally forlorn literature, such as her short compositions Clairières dans le ciel (1914) to the poetry of Francis Jammes:

"Today is the most beautiful of Easter days.

I plunged deep into the blue countryside,

across woods, across meadows, across fields.

How is it, O heart, you did not die a year ago?

O heart, once more I’ve caused you this Calvary

of seeing again this village where I suffered so,

the roses which bled before the vicarage,

the lilacs that kill me in their melancholy beds."

Boulanger's "Sous Bois" was performed by the choral ensemble Voices of Ascension in March 2019. Although the piece had fallen into obscurity during the 20th century, it is rightly undergoing a  popular revival of interest. 

References

Citron, M., 1991. Women and Music. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Pendle, K (ed). 

Classic FM., 2023. Who was Lili Boulanger? Meet the inspiring composer who died tragically young. Classic FM Discover Music. https://www.classicfm.com/discover-music/lili-boulanger/ 

Oxford International Song Festival., 2023. Songs: Demain fera un an by Lili Boulanger from Clairières dans le ciel (1914). https://oxfordsong.org/song/demain-fera-un-an 

Wikipedia., 2023. Lili Boulanger. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lili_Boulanger 

Johanna Müller-Hermann: String Quartet in E# major, Op. 6 (1912)

Johanna Müller-Hermann (1868 -1941), was an Austrian composer who studied with Guido Adler and Zemlinsky. Although she received a good musical education, in keeping with her comfortably middle-class background, she was not allowed to progress but was trained as a teacher. Her marriage in 1893 to the traffic specialist Otto Müller-Martini freed her to concentrate again on her music, studying piano, violin, theory and composition. It is a genuine tragedy that Müller-Hermann's music has been largely erased from history, one which can only be viewed through a feminist lens. Such a ruinous bowdlerisation is attributable to the insidious misogyny of nazism and a postwar cultural purism in which the "allies" should bear some responsibility.  

Return of the Light: Album Artwork

One of the first things I did in the new year was make a dance compilation to keep the blood pumping, called Return of the Light. Some of it is old skool house and dance choons which I think shouldn't fade into obscurity so easily; some feature nostalgic female vocal mixes, e.g. Sade & Lisa Stansfield; and some of it is less frequented but contemporary Euro-dance like Gudrun Von Laxenburg, Elin Ey, etc. Now the nights are drawing in a bit, I am already hankering after lullabies and incantations to welcome back the sun. Anyway, below is the album artwork I compiled. If you're interested in the music, the tracks are currently all available on Youtube. 

Paleomoussaka!

Say it! As all one word. It's so invigorating, you can really shout it. Shout it at random people in the street. Wait for friends and relatives to walk by and jump out of a murky recess, shouting PALEOMOUSSAKA with gusto like a maniacal murderer. It truly is good for the soul. 

This recipe, as the battlecry suggests, is a paleo modification of the Greek dish moussaka. That is to say, flour has been eliminated from the top layer part of the recipe, leaving only whole yummy goodness. Many paleo enthusiasts may take issue with the use of cheese, but I tolerate it quite well so have incorporated it. If you wanted to dispense with the cheese, you could go for a mushroom sauce type of thing, maybe using besan or chickpea flour to give it body. Consider my words of wisdom on this matter, and then create!

In essence, moussaka is a lasagne but using aubergine instead of lasagne sheets, so its already primed to be a paleo meal apart from the topping. Modify that, then bingo you've got Paleomoussaka.

  

A word on the ingredients. Obviously the fresher and more home-grown the ingredients are, the better. I think the key ingredient to prove that point is the tomatoes. If you have a bunch of luscious ripe, sweet tomatoes straight off the vine then you can see how that is very much superior to some anonymous,  industrially produced floor scrapings from a tin, but if that's all you've got then needs must. If you are asked by a dinner guest on the origin of your tomatoes just switch their attention to the sensual precociousness of your aubergines and that should hopefully spare your blushes. Or maybe contribute to them, depending on which way you swing. You will see that in place of 1 onion (yellow, red, both fine) in this recipe there are three good sized spring onions, but again it depends what is lurking in your garden. And finally, selection of a good cheese is essential if you are going to blag a moussaka topping by avoiding flour. High quality cheese and parmesan can prove a nutrient dense diversion from what's not there. Some people use potatoes in moussaka, but it's not a paleo option, so it's not in this recipe. 

Speaking of ingredient quality, both sweet marjoram and spearmint were doing well in my garden at the time (July), so I cut them fresh in the proportions of Marjoram 2:1 Spearmint and chopped them both up very fine together. Being quite aromatic (I used mostly leaf but also a little flower of both) few other fresh ingredients were needed. 

Now if I said just treat the whole bloody thing like you were making a lasagne you couldn't go far wrong from here, but below is the recipe, which I suppose is what you're here for: 

Ingredients

1. Moussaka component:

• 5 Tbsp olive oil
• 3 large spring onions, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic
• 500g minced lamb
• 8 medium mushrooms, finely chopped
• 8 large fresh tomatoes, finely chopped (+ tomato puree to thicken up if required)
• 2 Tbsp dry white wine
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon powder
• 1 tsp cumin powder
• 1 tsp ground coriander powder
• 2 Tbsp fresh sweet marjoram & spearmint in ratio of 2:1
• 2 medium-large aubergines sliced thinly
• Salt and pepper to taste

2. Top layer

• Dolmio Lasagne sauce (Creamy, family-sized version or similar) 
• Large handful of strong cheddar cheese

3. Garnish

• 2 Tbsp chopped parsley
• Parmesan cheese & pepper to taste

On the subject of the Dolmio. Yes, its a short cut compared to making a cheese sauce from scratch but if you choose a lasagne sauce that does not contain flour or gluten and you can tolerate lactose/ dairy, then you're winning. There is a modicum of glucose syrup in this sauce, which I object to, but total carbs in this product is 3% so the levels are bearable and conform to requirements of a keto diet. 

Method

• Preheat oven to 180°C. 
• Heat half of the olive oil in a large casserole dish over a moderate heat. 
• Saute the onion and garlic until they brown.
• Add lamb mince and mushrooms and increase the heat. 
• Cook through for 5 minutes, then add the wine, chopped tomatoes, and spices. 
• Reduce to a simmer and cook gently for 30 minutes.
• Meanwhile, heat the rest of the olive oil in batches in a frying pan set over a high heat until very hot. Fry the aubergine slices quickly until lightly golden on both sides. 
• Once coloured, layer the slices in a shallow, heatproof 2.5 litre baking dish. 
• Season between the aubergine layers with salt and pepper and set to one side.
• Add the Dolmio to a separate pan and heat through.
• Spoon the lamb sauce over the aubergine layer. 
• Pour the Dolmio topping over the lamb sauce and add the cheese on top.
• Bake for 30 minutes until the top is golden brown and bubbling. 
• Remove from the oven and allow it to sit for 5 minutes. 
• Spoon the moussaka onto serving plates and garnish with parsley, pepper and parmesan as desired. 
• Shout PALEOMOUSSAKA and dive in. 
• Enjoy!

Frank R. Paul (1884-1963)

The artwork of Frank R Paul is of course quite retro for sci-fi illustration, compared to modern day standards, but I think that's what gives it such naive appeal. I say naive, but it is arguably more advanced than contemporary sci-fi illustration, I expect because Frank R Paul was right in the middle of the post-war upswing in science & tech which was so creatively infective. His imaginative etchings ooze futuristic optimism in a way we fail to do. To Frank R Paul, the future was rich in possibility and daring. To us, living through this shit, each day is just another dystopian keystroke recorded on a surveillance server somewhere in Iceland. 

Win Hill Pike from Hope

"Win Hill Pike makes a delightful half-day excursion and whilst there are several interesting lines of ascent certainly that via Twitchell Farm is the most pleasant. At the opposite extreme the route from Yorkshire Bridge is indubitably a real horror, a muddy step-ladder under a heavy canopy of conifers. 

Geographically, Win Hill belongs to the Kinder Scout massif, but the long connecting bridge, forming a curtain barrier between the Woodlands and Noe valleys gives the hill a strong independence and may fairly claim to be one of the prime viewpoints of Peakland."

Mark Richards

High Peak Walks

I have climbed up Lose Hill a few times. The most notable occasion was in my early 20's. Having walked along the Edale valley from Cooper's camp site, my brother and I took a sharp ascent of Lose Hill over some barbed wire fences, stone walls and onto the rugged grassland above. From that approach Lose Hill offered three increasing gradients, so the energy expenditure in climbing it was deceptive; about half of your effort was spend on the final 1/3 of the hill. Although it was decades ago I remember getting to the top my very first time, and being in yearning need of a brew, but had to wait for my sluggardly sibling to arrive with the flask. Once he eventually arrived, he pulled out the flask only for us both to be greeted by the inimitable clank of broken glass and weak tea pissing out everywhere. For me, that moment most captured the essence of Lose Hill. 

Over the years I would reach the summit of Lose Hill, usually after walking the ridge from Mam Tor, to inwardly re-live my tea trauma and wistfully look across to Win Hill, imagining all the lucky walkers there with flasks full of hot tea, and reliably footsure brothers. Imagine my joy when this year I got my chance to see how the other half live. Although it was a hot day for walking, Win Hill is a feasible climb taking Mark Richard's advice and ascending via Wooler Knoll. Reaching the top of Win Hill and recalling flask-gate, I looked all around the Peaks like a conquering hero and realised that when you reach the top of Win Hill, all you can see around are losers.

"But we mount the heights of our being only to look down into darker colder chasms."

Margaret Fuller, 

From a letter to Elizabeth Hoar, May 15th 1859. 

View over Hope Valley

Tracker data

Walking route: 3D view (Drawing by Mark Richards)

Walking route: plan view (Drawing by Mark Richards)

Looking back towards Lose Hill, Great Ridge and Mam Tor

Looking North towards Ladybower Reservoir

Two heads of Ladybower

SE view of Lose Hill

Approaching Win Hill Pike, aka the Pimple

Ruins on the way down

References

Highland, Chris (Ed) (2007). Meditations of Margaret Fuller: The Inner Stream. Self Published.

Richards, Mark (1982). High Peak Walks: Walk 12 (pg.98). Cicerone Press. Reprinted 1989. 

Against Nature: J.K Huysmans (1884)

I recently read Joris-Karl Huysmans wonderfully decadent, extravagant masterpiece Against Nature (or, Against the Grain, translated from A Rebours), which has some of the most opulent Bohemian prose I have ever encountered. Although it is likely not a book suited to everyone's taste, it imparts a darkly enervated, droll aesthetic which is only paralleled by the crooked imaginings of Poe, and so is most at home on these pages. In the same week, and quite unconnectedly, I discovered that Alfred Hitchcock partnered with Salvador Dali in his 1945 film Spellbound, as artist and set designer in the film's psychoanalytic dream sequence.* For some reason, these two cultural phenomena have become linked in my mind, and I present below scenes from Dali's dream sequence, and paragraphs from Against Nature; a section where the reclusive anti-hero Des Esseintes over-indulges his latest obsession in exotic plants...

"Last of all, when he had sufficiently savoured the sight, he hurriedly scattered about exotic perfumes, exhausted his vaporizers, concentrated his strongest essences, gave the rein to all his balms, and lo! the stifling closeness of the room was filled with an atmosphere, maddening and sublime, breathing powerful influences, impregnating with raging alcoholates an artificial breeze,--an atmosphere unnatural, yet delightful, paradoxical in its union of the allspice of the Tropics, the pungent savours of the sandalwood of China and the hediosmia of Japan with native odours of jasmine, hawthorn and vervain, forcing, to grow together, in despite of seasons and climates, trees of diverse essences, flowers of colours and fragrances the most opposite, creating by the blending and shock of all these tones one common perfume, unknown, unforeseen, extraordinary, wherein re-appeared at intervals as a persistent refrain, the decorative phrase of the opening, the odour of the broad meadows breathed over by the lilacs and the lindens.

Suddenly a sharp agony assailed him; it felt as though a centre-bit were boring into his temples. He opened his eyes, to find himself once more in the middle of his study, seated before his working table; he got up and walked painfully, half-stunned, to the window, which he threw part open. A current of fresh air sweetened the stifling atmosphere that enveloped him; he marched up and down the room to recover the proper use of his limbs, going to and fro, his eyes fixed on the ceiling on which crabs and seaweed powdered with sea salt stood out in relief from a grained background, yellow as the sand of a beach. A similar design decorated the plinths bordering the panels, which in their turn were covered with Japanese crape, a watery green in colour and slightly waved to imitate the ripple of a wind-blown river, while down the gentle current floated a rose leaf round which frolicked a swarm of little fishes dashed in with two strokes of the pen.

But his eyes were still heavy; he left off pacing the short length of floor between the font and the bath and leant his elbows on the window sill. Presently his dizziness ceased, and after carefully recorking the bottles of scents and essences, he seized the opportunity to tidy his apparatus for making up the face,--his paints and powders and the like. He had not touched these things since his arrival at Fontenay, and he was almost astonished now at the sight of this collection once visited by so many women. One on top of the other, phials and porcelain pots littered the table confusion. 

Here was a china box, of the green sort, containing schnouda, that marvellous white cream which, once spread on the cheeks, changes under the influence of the air to a tender pink, then to a scarlet so natural that it gives an absolutely convincing illusion of a complexion mantling with red blood; there, jars incrusted with mother-o'-pearl held Japanese gold and Athens green, coloured like the wing of the cantharides beetle, golds and greens that blend into a deep purple directly they are moistened; beside pots full of filbert paste, of serkis of the harem, of emulsions of Cashmere lilies, of lotions of strawberry and elderfiower for the skin, beside little phials of solutions of India-ink and rose-water for the eyes, lay a host of different instruments, of mother-o'-pearl, of ivory and of silver, mixed up with dainty brushes for the teeth and gums,--pincers, scissors, strigils, stumps, crimpers, powder-puffs, back-scratchers, patches and files. He handled all this elaborate apparatus, bought in former days to please a mistress who found an ineffable pleasure in certain aromatics and certain balms, an ill-balanced, nerve-ridden woman, who loved to have her nipples macerated in scents, but who only really experienced a genuine and over-mastering ecstasy when her head was tickled with a comb and she could, in the act of being caressed by a lover, breathe the smell of chimney soot, of wet plaster from a house building in rainy weather, or of dust churned up by the heavy thunder drops of a summer storm."

* Interestingly, these eyeball scenes are similar to the Eyes from Metropolis, by Fritz Lang (1927) and I wonder if Dali was influenced by this technique. I say 'wonder' because with any other artist I would be certain it was an act of plagiarism, but Dali was such a creative force that I expect he could quite independently come up with such an idea. 

Wayne Shorter: A Wish for Eternity

 

“When all those records came out, I didn’t know they would be thought of as classics or ABCs of modern jazz. Most of those tunes came out just like that – real quick… and if anything was behind them it was like a wish that was manifested musically: maybe a wish for eternity or a beautiful girl.” 

Wayne Shorter. 

Such was the genius of the man, that intellectually, intentionally, he didn’t comprehend how he was constructing such sublime impressionistic harmony, and nor did he need to. Rather, it came from his soul, or perhaps from above. Such was the instantaneous authenticity of his talent. And that is what made him an improvisational jazz master. Musicologists in the future will try to unravel it, and maybe they will succeed, but it will take people outside of the reference frame in which this music was created to interpret what amounts to a Venutian language. 

The fact that Wayne Shorter was a Nichiren Buddhist was no accident in my opinion. His mastery expressed itself spiritually in the music of jazz, and in the rhythm of chanting. The beauteous simplicity of Nichiren chanting demands a sort of manifesting, faith-in-action. And in his troubled life, Wayne Shorter perhaps needed it more than most. 

The beautiful woman on the front of the Speak No Evil album, recorded in 1964, was of his wife, Teruko (Irene) Nakagami, described by Shorter as “like a pretty Japanese Audrey Hepburn.” Shorter dedicated the pieces "Miyako" and "Infant Eyes" to their daughter, and the album was copyrighted as "Miyako Music." Through this filter the whole album takes on the magnificence of a man in love with his family and playfully exploring his universal creativity. Sadly the relationship did not last and they separated in 1966, the year of release of the album. It always strikes me as ironic that such a brief testimony of love as Speak No Evil, was brought to the world when it was over. 

Shorter remarried Ana Maria Patricio in 1970. Their daughter Iska died of a grand mal seizure at the age of 14, and both Ana Maria and the couple's niece, Dalila, were both tragically killed in a plane crash while travelling to visit Shorter in Italy in 1996. Shorter eventually remarried Carolina Dos Santos, a close friend of Ana Maria, and I hope found happiness. Nichiren Daishonin said “Do not go about complaining how hard it is to live in this world. such behavior is entirely unworthy of a real man.” And I think Shorter lived by that principle, joyously. I wish that he is transported to Sagga on winds of eternal Jazz music in gratitude for his Buddhahood and gifts to us all.

The Gohonzon is a Chinese-Sanskrit scroll containing  characters that aids practitioners of Nichiren Buddhism to develop Buddhahood from within their lives.

Khabaram Raseeda: Fareed Ayaz and Abu Muhammad (2012)

 

From Episode 2 of the Pakistani Coke Studio (Season 5, 2012). A ghazal adaptation of Khabaram Raseeda by lyricist Amir Khusrau (1253–1325 CE). Ghazals derive from Arabic poetry and declare spiritual and romantic love and longing. In the case of Khabaram Raseeda (lyrics below) the longing is for realisation of the divine in total absorption and surrender, in dying to oneself in the Sufi/ Yogic death-before-death. And thus our ego is washed away like embers of a beach fire on the shore, or demolished like sands on the wind. It is beautiful, tragic, endlessly creative. I like to think if there is an afterlife, the doors will one day fling open and this will be the devotional music which greets my ears. 

Tonight there came a news that you, oh beloved, would come –
Be my head sacrificed to the road along which you will come riding!
All the gazelles of the desert have put their heads on their hands
In the hope that one day you will come to hunt them….
The attraction of love won’t leave you unmoved;
Should you not come to my funeral,
you’ll definitely come to my grave.
My soul has come on my lips (e.g. I am on the point of expiring);
Come so that I may remain alive –
After I am no longer – for what purpose will you come?

Melanie Gaydos

I first saw Melanie Gaydos in the sci-fi Vesper (2022), where she plays a doomed 'jug' (genetically engineered human slave). After a swift google, I discovered she is a highly successful model with the condition ectodermal dysplasia (ED).

ED is a heritable genetic disorder which affects the development of various ectodermal structures (including skin, teeth, hair, nails, exocrine and sebaceous glands). There are at least 177 Mendelian presentations of ED. The condition was medically described as far back as 1792, and we know Charles Darwin was made aware of a case of 10 Hindu relatives with ED, by means of an 1838 letter from David Wedderburn (a humble disciple of Darwinism). With so many clinical presentations, it could make diagnosis difficult and since baldness and hypohidrosis (absence of sweating) are sometimes implicated, it does make you wonder about Prince Andrew doesn't it. 

For more on ED see:  Deshmukh, S., & Prashanth, S. (2012). Ectodermal Dysplasia: A Genetic Review. International Journal of Clinical Pediatric Dentistry, 5 (3), 197.

As far as Melanie Gaydos goes, she has tenaciously challenged modelling orthodoxy with incredible bravery and style. She possesses an otherworldly allure which has spawned a number of unique creative projects which perhaps only she could inspire. I include some samples of her work below.