After rediscovering this Franz Schubert piece I'm joyfully posting this magical performance of it. The Hurdy Gurdy Man.
YOUTUBE POST:
"..... watching Quasthoff sing "Der Leiermann" is a really unique experience in the world of recorded music on DVD nowadays, a deeply touching moment of absolute union between music and singer, between composer and performer, like his face shows in all the song, and
like his voice sings"
from Franz Schubert's song cycle "Die Winterreise", op. 89, D. 911
Thomas Quasthoff, baritone
Daniel Barenboim, piano
Filmed live at the Berlin Philharmonie on 22 March 2005
CAL BEARS PAC 10 CHAMPIONS!
California's Jamal Boykin celebrates after California defeatedArizona State 62-46, clinching at least a share of the
Pac-10 Championship, Saturday, Feb. 27, 2010, in Berkeley,
Calif. (AP Photo/George Nikitin)
Congratulations Coach Montgomery and Cal Bears Basketball for reaching that elusive mountaintop.
A Blast From Wrestling Past
I really haven't been a WWE fan of late. But there are two characters that I've always thought could be undercover Raiders fans. Those two are the Undertaker and his eccentric General Manager Paul Bearer. Anyone who carries an urn of defeated opponents ashes around with him is welcome to be a part of the Raider Nation. A toast goes out to Taker and Paul, there will always be a place for you in our Nation.
TAG! Richard Seymour is It.
Yes, the Oakland Raiders have pinned the exclusive franchise tag on DE Richard Seymour to the price tag of approximately $12,398,000.00. Seymour, a five-time pro bowler in his nine-year career, will renegotiate a contract with the Raiders, and only the Raiders. A multi-year contract is possible.
Black Diamond: Baseball's Negro Leagues
I'd read somewhere that when major league baseball integrated with the Dodgers signing of Jackie Robinson in 1947, they opened the door for America to begin desegregation. The following year, President Harry S. Truman would sign executive order 9981 which states:
"It is hereby declared to be the policy of the President that there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin."
Six years later NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall would win a suprrme court case that ruled segregation in public schools as unconstitutional. From there sprang the Civil Rights Movement for racial equality in America. The movement continues to fight battles for minority equality in America.
Today I gave a book about the Negro Leagues of Baseball to a traveling friend. Its a book I've read more than once and felt that my friend would truly enjoy. It felt like giving a gift that you wanted to keep for yourself. I parted with the book knowing that my friend would enjoy reading it on his journey back east. Before giving him the book I spent about thirty minutes flipping through its pages and saying goodbye to some of the stories in it. I know I'll come across the book again, but for me, parting with books is like wishing a friend well on a journey, just as this friend of mine was journeying. Its great to send a visiting friend off with a friendly gift.
Well, in leafing through the book's pages I came across a few paragraphs I wanted to retain as a memory of my friend the book. Here below are the book and the lines from it that show in words what the negro baseball players faced every day of their lives; a color barrier that prevented them from gaining national sports recognition as professionals of the game they loved so much, baseball. Though Negro men had proven themselves heroic, capable of soldiering bravely in foreign battles of World War II, America was still treating them as second class citizens or less here at home. Major League Baseball would lead the nation in recovering from its racial prejudicial past. The nation, even with a Black President, is still playing catch up.
excerpt from"Black Diamond: The Story of the Negro Baseball Leagues"
by Patricia McKissack & Fredrick McKissack, Jr.
Only one thing is keeping them out of the big leagues, and that is the pigmentation of their skin." Shirley Povich washington post
Clark Griffith, owner of the Washington senators, the first one to speak out against the 'gentleman's agreement" that had banned blacks from the sport since the National League was founded, made this famous prediction:
"A lone Negro in the game will face caustic comments. He will be made the target of cruel, filthy epithets. Of course, I know the time will come when the ice will have to be broken. Both by the organized game and by the colored player who is willing to volunteer and thus become a sort of martyr to the cause."
Gabby Hartnett, manager of the Chicago cubs, added this: "If managers were given permission, there'd be a mad rush to sign up Negroes."
Although the critics of segregation were growing in number, there weren't enough of them to overcome the strong opposition that wanted to maintain the status quo. They used these arguments to keep the color line clearly drawn:
1. A large number of major league players were southerners, and they wouldn't play with or against black players.
2. Fans might riot if there was a dispute between a white and black player.
3. The clubs trained in the South. Black players couldn't stay in hotels, and they were forbidden by law to participate in sports with whites.
4. Black players just weren't good enough.
Everybody knew these were hollow excuses, but nobody was willing to rock the boat.
Black players had heard it all before. "We didn't think anything was going to happen," said Buck Leonard. "We thought that they were just going to keep talking about it, that's all. They'd talked about it all those years and there'd been nothing done. We just didn't pay it any attention. We'd say, well, if it comes, we hope to have a chance to play, but we just didn't pay it any mind."
The African American Baseball Experience
The African American Baseball Experience
How The Raiders Came To Oaktown
Like most Raiders fans I miss football season. Sure we only won five games, but you know our motto; Win, Lose or Tie!
So to pass the time until the NFL draft comes around I figured I'd brush up on my Raiders history. It never ceases to amaze me that just when I think I know Oakland Raiders history fact from fiction, I discover something new.
I came across this blog post titled "How The Raiders Came To Oakland." I'd once read about the AFL/NFL in the late 50's early 60'scompeting to enroll cities for football franchises. I knew that the AFL Chiefs were originally in Dallas until the NFL setup the Cowboys in the same city to drive business away from the Chiefs. Instead, it pushed the Chiefs to find a new home in Kansas City. As for our Oakland Raiders, it would be another NFL franchise that we can thank for opening the door to a Silver & Black franchise being granted in the bay.
Here's the beginning of the post with a link to the full story:
Raider Nation has the Minnesota Vikings to thank for Oakland ever having a team. When the American Football League (AFL) was being formed in late 1959 - early 1960, Minnesota was one of the cities ready to join the new league. The AFL was being formed by Lamar Hunt and other investors who had made numerous unsuccessful attempts to get an expansion team from the NFL for their city. read the full story
Beautiful Black HerStory
This beautiful actress makes me proud to be from the east coast. A place where sistas keep their beauty real with all naturalness. For as much eye candy that Los Angeles has to offer, there's really no substitute for a beautiful homegrown woman with piercing intelligent eyes encased in a soulful Black face. I mean, just look at her folks! Impeccable with a fresh style all her own. And God Made WOman.
post from Black Beauty of the Day blog
Malinda Williams (1975- ) is an American actress, probably best known for playing Tracy "Bird" van Adams on "Soul Food" on Showtime from 2000 to 2004. She was married to Mekhi Phifer from 1999 to 2003 and has a son by him. In 2008 she married D-Nice. She grew up and lives in Westfield, New Jersey in suburban New York.
Tiger Restores Integrity, Media Left Starving
Today's apology press conference by Tiger Woods may not have been on the media's terms, but Tiger stood up and acknowledged his selfish actions that led to hurting his family and those close to him. Sure he threw in his partnerships for good measure, the brotha still gotta eat. Tiger expressed sincere sorrow and remorse and spoke of the help he's getting to conquer infidelity. Tiger seemed humbled.
At first I wasn't all for hearing a Tiger apology for something that happened in his personal life. But after hearing his apology I learned just how much of a role model he is to kids and philanthropic organizations around the world.
For some of us we didn't need to hear Tiger apologize to accept him as a good human being who makes mistakes.
For some of us we'll never accept an apology from Tiger because we feel some actions are unforgivable.
And for many, like those in the media, who treat stories of this nature like a Thanksgiving Day turkey, they appreciate the apology BUT they're still hungry. After stuffing this story and basting it for months, they expected to carve and feed on it until only a stripped down carcass remained. Most turkeys would have just let them run the show, allowing themselves to be plucked and picked apart by these vultures. But Woods showed us that he's not the turkey the media's been dressing and basting for their viewers. He showed us the real Tiger who does things on his own terms and for reasons he feels are important.
Funny with this being the Chinese Year of the Tiger, that here our media is trying desperately to slay/lynch a Tiger on an international stage. Watch in the next few days the actions and words of angry vultures who just didn't get enough to eat.
Maybe if the media could think in the interest of Tiger's family instead of ratings and sales. But wait a minute, what was I thinking, this is America, where making money by exploitation has been fine tuned to an art form.
Congratulations Tiger on winning by far your best round of competition against hungry opponents. But stay attentive, they'll continue in underhanded ways to try exploiting and exposing your weaknesses. Even if it means changing the playing rules. Don't sleep on the media brotha. It seems they have a way of making those who they've spotlighted during good times, feel obligated to tell them all during bad times. Then its sell sell sell!
"The Jungle Creed Says The Strongest Feed
On Any Prey It Can.
And I Was Branded Beast At Every Feast
Before I Ever Became A Man"
"Movie Deep Cover"
I'm Mad As Hell, And I'm Not Gonna Take It Anymore!
Ever experience that feeling of helplessness when confronting the Internal Revenue Service about your "past transgressions?" Well, today's news reports that some poor tax payer, completely frustrated and crazed over his inability to see things through the IRS's eyes, just couldn't take it anymore.
Case and point. In Austin, Texas today fifty-three year old Joseph Stack wrote a suicide note, set fire to his home and proceeded to drive 30 miles to Georgia, Tx where his single-engine Piper Cherokee is housed. He did not file a flight plan which is proper protocol for any flight.
After a thunderous explosion followed by fire ripped through a seven story building that houses the IRS in Austin,Tx, it soon became apparent where Stacks flight plan was filed; in his disturbed mind.
In the suicide note left behind, Stack cited run-ins with the IRS tax agency, government bailouts and corporate America's "thugs and plunderers." Yes folks, Stack was mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore. Here's some of what else was in the note:
"I have had all I can stand," he wrote in the note, dated Thursday, adding: "I choose not to keep looking over my shoulder at `big brother' while he strips my carcass."
I'm sure some of us tax payers have felt like stripped carcasses after paying our dues to our country. But "Come'On Man," you can't go flying planes into buildings and harming innocent people because things didn't go your way. I wonder if Stack had already tried yelling out his window that he was mad as hell and not gonna take this anymore? Maybe, just maybe, the crazed voice inside his troubled head answered back.
Read the rest of the terror filled story. Man Angry At IRS Crashes Plane Into Building
ESPN On Demand CLASSIC
Tonight while surfing through On Demand sports I randomly chose ESPN. I was then shown a full page of ESPN choices that included the following:
Poker
World Cup
Australian Open
Tyson
So you can guess which one I clicked on. For the next two hours or so I relived the short classic boxing era that was all knockout Iron Mike Tyson's.
For five long years beginning in 1985, Iron Mike was a brutal force in professional boxing. His approach was very simple. He entered the ring, always touched gloves kindly with his opponent after instructions, then commenced in tagging said opponent with power punches that bordered on a felony assault. The young Mike Tyson displayed power and quickness that the boxing world hadn't seen since Sonny Liston and Foe Frazier. His first 19 professional fights all ended in knockouts, 13 of which were in round 1.
The young Mike Tyson bobbed and weaved with such quickness that his opponent usually didn't see the punch that ended the fight. Mike Tyson would become a boxing phenomenon known throughout the world and feared by boxers. You'd see the fear in the eyes of opponents as soon as the bell would ring to begin round 1. Legendary fighters like Michael Spinks and Larry Holmes, an old Holmes, were no exception to the fear factor once in the ring with Tyson. Tyson forced us to love his powerful style. In hindsight, I believe mankind feared Mike Tyson at the pinnacle of his career.
Challengers with names like James 'Bonecrusher' Smith, Carl 'The Truth' Williams, Tony 'TNT' Tubbs and 'Slammin' Sammy Scaff fell victim to the power and speed of attack of a young Mike Tyson. Tyson became the first Heavyweight to unify all three boxing titles. Nintendo had come out with a video game titled "Mike Tyson's Knockout Punch" and as Scarface so prophetically stated "The World is Yours!" The 1980's would end with Mike Tyson as the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.
Then came Feb. 11, 1990, a night that'll live in the annals of sports infamy. It was Tyson's second time fighting in Japan, the first being a first round knockout of Michael Spinks, you remember, Leons younger brother.
The challenger? B u s t e r D o u g l a s, a man who's mother had recently died, wanted to win it for his mom. Nobody, and I mean nobody thought Buster had a fighting chance of even making it out of the first minute much less the first round. But I guess Buster's deceased mom put in a special divine order for her underdog son and the stage was set for history. Every boxing fan would remember the climatic call in the 10th round, the round following a knockdown of Douglas in the ninth. The only one who may not remember is Iron Mike. Here's a look back at history in the making some 20 years ago:
Poker
World Cup
Australian Open
Tyson
So you can guess which one I clicked on. For the next two hours or so I relived the short classic boxing era that was all knockout Iron Mike Tyson's.
For five long years beginning in 1985, Iron Mike was a brutal force in professional boxing. His approach was very simple. He entered the ring, always touched gloves kindly with his opponent after instructions, then commenced in tagging said opponent with power punches that bordered on a felony assault. The young Mike Tyson displayed power and quickness that the boxing world hadn't seen since Sonny Liston and Foe Frazier. His first 19 professional fights all ended in knockouts, 13 of which were in round 1.
The young Mike Tyson bobbed and weaved with such quickness that his opponent usually didn't see the punch that ended the fight. Mike Tyson would become a boxing phenomenon known throughout the world and feared by boxers. You'd see the fear in the eyes of opponents as soon as the bell would ring to begin round 1. Legendary fighters like Michael Spinks and Larry Holmes, an old Holmes, were no exception to the fear factor once in the ring with Tyson. Tyson forced us to love his powerful style. In hindsight, I believe mankind feared Mike Tyson at the pinnacle of his career.
Challengers with names like James 'Bonecrusher' Smith, Carl 'The Truth' Williams, Tony 'TNT' Tubbs and 'Slammin' Sammy Scaff fell victim to the power and speed of attack of a young Mike Tyson. Tyson became the first Heavyweight to unify all three boxing titles. Nintendo had come out with a video game titled "Mike Tyson's Knockout Punch" and as Scarface so prophetically stated "The World is Yours!" The 1980's would end with Mike Tyson as the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.
Then came Feb. 11, 1990, a night that'll live in the annals of sports infamy. It was Tyson's second time fighting in Japan, the first being a first round knockout of Michael Spinks, you remember, Leons younger brother.
The challenger? B u s t e r D o u g l a s, a man who's mother had recently died, wanted to win it for his mom. Nobody, and I mean nobody thought Buster had a fighting chance of even making it out of the first minute much less the first round. But I guess Buster's deceased mom put in a special divine order for her underdog son and the stage was set for history. Every boxing fan would remember the climatic call in the 10th round, the round following a knockdown of Douglas in the ninth. The only one who may not remember is Iron Mike. Here's a look back at history in the making some 20 years ago:
Sebastian Janikowski Signs 4-Year Deal
The Oakland Raiders career scoring leader has just signed a $16 million dollar deal that will keep him wearing Silver and Black for four more years. Kicker Sebastian Janikowski has been the Raiders most consistent scoring threat over these dismal years. Sea-Bass deserves every penny the contract pays him. He's stayed loyal and committed to the Raiders for what seems like a decade.
Congratulations Raiders and Sebastian Janikowski for taking care of off-season business. Now let's begin putting together a nice wardrobe of Silver and Black for DE Richard Seymour.
Saints Prove Good GM Equates Succes
Listed as one of the keys to SBXLIV Champion New Orleans Saints success is the outstanding work of General Manager Mickey Loomis. Here's what NFL.com Sr. Analyst Pat Kirwan had to say about it:
Build the back end
The story behind the story for the Saints is the great job general manager Mickey Loomis did putting together the back end of his roster. New Orleans' injured reserve list was in the double digits, but the team still managed to succeed.
Key players such as left tackle Jammal Brown, defensive tackle Kendrick Clancy, defensive end Charles Grant and fullback Heath Evans had to be replaced during the season and other core special teamers and quality reserves also went down.
Most teams that lose four starters, especially when three of them play with their hand on the ground, don't get to a Super Bowl, let alone win it.
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