Jono Starsmore (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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fandomhigh2018-01-12 08:29 am
furnaceface) wrote in fandomhigh2018-01-12 08:29 am
Entry tags:
Music Appreciation, Friday, 1st Period
One of these days, Jono would get to teach a class that wasn't first thing in the morning. Did anybody realize how cruel it was to give a first period class to a man who couldn't drink coffee? Still, he was here. And looking more or less functional this morning. Miraculously.
//Alright,// he said, giving a nod to the class. //Now that you've got a week of introductions behind you, hopefully you're ready to do some actual learning. This week, we're doing our obligatory class about songs about home.//
It was obligatory only because they'd done it once before. Now the class was stuck with it forever. It, and, unfortunately, several country music songs. This would be Jono's fault. He'd noticed that home was a pretty common theme, there, so his picks had kind of leaned into it hard for this lesson.
Whereas Hannibal's were mostly classical. Quelle surprise. "I thought we would begin with a song that those of you from this world or a similar one may be familiar with, though you may not know its history. "Home Sweet Home" is originally from an opera, Clari, or the Maid of Milan, and is over one hundred fifty years old. Here it is, as sung by Dame Joan Sutherland, a rather famous operatic soprano."
When that was done, he continued. "Next, we have "O Patria Mia", from the opera Aïda by Giuseppi Verdi, as sung by Leontyne Price. In it, Aïda sings of her love for her homeland that she will never see again."
"Since home is hardly a European convention, I thought I would also include a song my aunt taught me as a child. A Japanese song just over one hundred years old, "Furusato" speaks of the love of someone for their homeland and their desire to return there."
He let that play. "To prove that you needn't have words to speak to a theme, I present to you Chopin's Mazurka in A-Minor, Opus 17, number 4. Chopin was a Polish composer and pianist. Forced to live in France for much of his life, his music often reflects his homesickness and love of his country.
Once that had played, he glanced with a slightly mischievous smile at Jono. "For my last song today, I've opted for something a little more modern, though still a modern classic. 'Caledonia' is a Scottish folk ballad written by a man named Dougie MacLean; again, it speaks of the love for home and need to return to it, Caledonia being a Roman term for Scotland. It follows a long tradition of folk songs of the area; this version is sung by a man named Euan Morton."
//It seems,// Jono noted, //that most modern songs that talk about home are country music, possibly because the genre as a whole seems to focus more on things like small town or farm life, and there isn't a shortage of laments about missing the place they came from, as narrated by everybody from farmers who moved to the city, to fugitives on the run. I'll try to limit the country selection today, and I'll even play the Johnny Cash version of Green Green Grass of Home for you, to give you some idea of what you're in for with an older country song along those lines. More modern country on the topic tends to be a bit more upbeat, with country musicians singing about their more fond memories of home, as in Montgomery Gentry's song My Town, or Brooks & Dunn's song, Red Dirt Road.//
A beat.
//And that's all the country you'll hear from me today, don't worry. Home is fortunately a fairly pervasive element in enough people's lives to be found in other music as well, if not to quite that extent. Musicals will often also touch on the topic of returning home, as they did in a touching retrospective number by a certain Transylvanian in Petey Sci-Fi Talky Picture... which didn't turn out well for him, granted. In that particular case, the song about home and the wistful hopefulness of it mostly served to add to the shock value of what came directly afterward.// Which students were going to have to watch for themselves. Jono wasn't going to spoil the movie, even if it was forty years old.
//Talk of home is also a common theme in songs during wartime throughout history, even if it's only touched on briefly. People remember the loved ones they left behind fondly, home being more about the people than the particular location. Vera Lynn's We'll Meet Again shows a very different sort of hopefulness and fondness for what was left behind than the last song, clinging to the belief that no matter what comes, there'll be a future with those people who matter the most, someday.//
Did you think he was done? You were silly. Jono and music, remember.
//Then, bringing it into something both more modern and less country than the rest of the music I've mentioned, there are several rock songs on the matter as well, from Ozzy Osbourne's Mama, I'm Coming Home, to Bon Jovi's Who Says You Can't Go Home? Hell, there's even some more crossover with country, here, with one of those fugitive songs I mentioned before, Break it To Them Gently, by Burton Cummings of The Guess Who.// A beat. //Not to be confused with The Who. Different band entirely. And come to think of it, the song did have a country cover, at that. Gil Grand did it. And I'm not even touching on that most obvious category of 'songs about home,' the national anthem. I'm certain most of us are at least somewhat familiar with the concept.//
He wasn't going to play one mostly because he couldn't make up his mind as to whether he was supposed to play Star Spangled Banner or God Save the Queen. So, there was that. Jono shrugged his shoulders and looked to Hannibal.
"So, do you have a favorite song about home? What sorts of lyrics or music make you think of your home? Show us your own songs. Compose one on the spot, if you're so inclined. Or pull one up on the computer," they had one specifically wired to decent speakers this week, "and play it for us."
//And if there's anything about the songs we played that speak to you particularly, you can discuss that, as well. I'm curious to see if you can spot any shared themes they might have besides the mentions of home itself.//
Like, say, rampant nostalgia. There was a lot of rampant nostalgia.
[OOC: Open!]
//Alright,// he said, giving a nod to the class. //Now that you've got a week of introductions behind you, hopefully you're ready to do some actual learning. This week, we're doing our obligatory class about songs about home.//
It was obligatory only because they'd done it once before. Now the class was stuck with it forever. It, and, unfortunately, several country music songs. This would be Jono's fault. He'd noticed that home was a pretty common theme, there, so his picks had kind of leaned into it hard for this lesson.
Whereas Hannibal's were mostly classical. Quelle surprise. "I thought we would begin with a song that those of you from this world or a similar one may be familiar with, though you may not know its history. "Home Sweet Home" is originally from an opera, Clari, or the Maid of Milan, and is over one hundred fifty years old. Here it is, as sung by Dame Joan Sutherland, a rather famous operatic soprano."
When that was done, he continued. "Next, we have "O Patria Mia", from the opera Aïda by Giuseppi Verdi, as sung by Leontyne Price. In it, Aïda sings of her love for her homeland that she will never see again."
"Since home is hardly a European convention, I thought I would also include a song my aunt taught me as a child. A Japanese song just over one hundred years old, "Furusato" speaks of the love of someone for their homeland and their desire to return there."
He let that play. "To prove that you needn't have words to speak to a theme, I present to you Chopin's Mazurka in A-Minor, Opus 17, number 4. Chopin was a Polish composer and pianist. Forced to live in France for much of his life, his music often reflects his homesickness and love of his country.
Once that had played, he glanced with a slightly mischievous smile at Jono. "For my last song today, I've opted for something a little more modern, though still a modern classic. 'Caledonia' is a Scottish folk ballad written by a man named Dougie MacLean; again, it speaks of the love for home and need to return to it, Caledonia being a Roman term for Scotland. It follows a long tradition of folk songs of the area; this version is sung by a man named Euan Morton."
//It seems,// Jono noted, //that most modern songs that talk about home are country music, possibly because the genre as a whole seems to focus more on things like small town or farm life, and there isn't a shortage of laments about missing the place they came from, as narrated by everybody from farmers who moved to the city, to fugitives on the run. I'll try to limit the country selection today, and I'll even play the Johnny Cash version of Green Green Grass of Home for you, to give you some idea of what you're in for with an older country song along those lines. More modern country on the topic tends to be a bit more upbeat, with country musicians singing about their more fond memories of home, as in Montgomery Gentry's song My Town, or Brooks & Dunn's song, Red Dirt Road.//
A beat.
//And that's all the country you'll hear from me today, don't worry. Home is fortunately a fairly pervasive element in enough people's lives to be found in other music as well, if not to quite that extent. Musicals will often also touch on the topic of returning home, as they did in a touching retrospective number by a certain Transylvanian in Petey Sci-Fi Talky Picture... which didn't turn out well for him, granted. In that particular case, the song about home and the wistful hopefulness of it mostly served to add to the shock value of what came directly afterward.// Which students were going to have to watch for themselves. Jono wasn't going to spoil the movie, even if it was forty years old.
//Talk of home is also a common theme in songs during wartime throughout history, even if it's only touched on briefly. People remember the loved ones they left behind fondly, home being more about the people than the particular location. Vera Lynn's We'll Meet Again shows a very different sort of hopefulness and fondness for what was left behind than the last song, clinging to the belief that no matter what comes, there'll be a future with those people who matter the most, someday.//
Did you think he was done? You were silly. Jono and music, remember.
//Then, bringing it into something both more modern and less country than the rest of the music I've mentioned, there are several rock songs on the matter as well, from Ozzy Osbourne's Mama, I'm Coming Home, to Bon Jovi's Who Says You Can't Go Home? Hell, there's even some more crossover with country, here, with one of those fugitive songs I mentioned before, Break it To Them Gently, by Burton Cummings of The Guess Who.// A beat. //Not to be confused with The Who. Different band entirely. And come to think of it, the song did have a country cover, at that. Gil Grand did it. And I'm not even touching on that most obvious category of 'songs about home,' the national anthem. I'm certain most of us are at least somewhat familiar with the concept.//
He wasn't going to play one mostly because he couldn't make up his mind as to whether he was supposed to play Star Spangled Banner or God Save the Queen. So, there was that. Jono shrugged his shoulders and looked to Hannibal.
"So, do you have a favorite song about home? What sorts of lyrics or music make you think of your home? Show us your own songs. Compose one on the spot, if you're so inclined. Or pull one up on the computer," they had one specifically wired to decent speakers this week, "and play it for us."
//And if there's anything about the songs we played that speak to you particularly, you can discuss that, as well. I'm curious to see if you can spot any shared themes they might have besides the mentions of home itself.//
Like, say, rampant nostalgia. There was a lot of rampant nostalgia.
[OOC: Open!]
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