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Herbert Stothart has composed many wonderful scores and deserves an equal position among the great composers of Golden Age film music. However he seems to be almost ignored when it comes to new releases. Very few of his scores have been released and so many are yet to come. To name some of them, Anna Karenina (1935), David Copperfield (1935), Camille (1936), Marie Antoinette (1938), Waterloo Bridge (1940), Pride and Prejudice (1940), Blossoms in the Dust (1941), Mrs. Miniver (1942), Madame Curie (1943), The White Cliffs of Dover (1944), The Valley of Decision (1945), The Green Years (1946), High Barbaree (1947), If Winter Comes (1947), The Miniver Story (1950). The above titles are among the best known of Stothart scores and sadly are nowhere to be found, not even as re-recordings. We would like FSM to release more Herbert Stothart original soundtracks. We love Steiner, Rozsa, Korngold, Newman, Herrmann, Young, Waxman. We also love Stothart and would gladly welcome more of his compositions.
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Herbert Stothart has composed many wonderful scores and deserves an equal position among the great composers of Golden Age film music.
Along with Steiner, Waxman, Rózsa, Newman, et al?
He most certainly does NOT. He often recycled classical themes wholesale and didn't in fact composer many scores himself. I remember André Previn in his book on life at MGM ("No Minor Chords") when he was asked to arrange the theme of a Stothart score (usually Stothart would supply a single melodic line), and, at the recording sessions, when Stothart conducted the score, he leaned towards André and said: "Did I write this?" Authorship of his scores should be controversial, I think he had a lot of "ghosts".
I remember I liked The Valley of Decision very much when I saw the film many years ago, but looking back and with more knowlegde about Stothart's working methods I think helping hands did most of it, too. I also recall Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) from an old Tony Thomas-produced LP. That one was dreadful.
BTW: The Miniver Story was composed by Miklós Rózsa from themes "by Herbert Stothart". Rózsa mentions the job in his autobiography.
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Herbert Stothart has composed many wonderful scores and deserves an equal position among the great composers of Golden Age film music.
Along with Steiner, Waxman, Rózsa, Newman, et al?
He most certainly does NOT. He often recycled classical themes wholesale and didn't in fact composer many scores himself. I remember André Previn in his book on life at MGM ("No Minor Chords") when he was asked to arrange the theme of a Stothart score (usually Stothart would supply a single melodic line), and, at the recording sessions, when Stothart conducted the score, he leaned towards André and said: "Did I write this?" Authorship of his scores should be controversial, I think he had a lot of "ghosts".
I remember I liked The Valley of Decision very much when I saw the film many years ago, but looking back and with more knowlegde about Stothart's working methods I think helping hands did most of it, too. I also recall Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) from an old Tony Thomas-produced LP. That one was dreadful.
BTW: The Miniver Story was composed by Miklós Rózsa from themes "by Herbert Stothart". Rózsa mentions the job in his autobiography.
I didn't know about The Miniver Story. I found out this title as composed by Stothart.
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It was just a "hack job" for Rózsa, which he mentions in passing and with a slightly humorous touch. Apparently he more or less re-arranged the music from the original Miniver movie.
He desperately wanted to leave andf score Quo Vadis? and had to finish the Stothart assignment first. That's how I recall it, I'd have to look at ther book again for the specifics.
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Herbert Stothart has composed many wonderful scores and deserves an equal position among the great composers of Golden Age film music.
Along with Steiner, Waxman, Rózsa, Newman, et al?
He most certainly does NOT. He often recycled classical themes wholesale and didn't in fact composer many scores himself. I remember André Previn in his book on life at MGM ("No Minor Chords") when he was asked to arrange the theme of a Stothart score (usually Stothart would supply a single melodic line), and, at the recording sessions, when Stothart conducted the score, he leaned towards André and said: "Did I write this?" Authorship of his scores should be controversial, I think he had a lot of "ghosts".
I remember I liked The Valley of Decision very much when I saw the film many years ago, but looking back and with more knowlegde about Stothart's working methods I think helping hands did most of it, too. I also recall Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) from an old Tony Thomas-produced LP. That one was dreadful.
BTW: The Miniver Story was composed by Miklós Rózsa from themes "by Herbert Stothart". Rózsa mentions the job in his autobiography.
Here is what Brendan G. Carroll , Erich Wolfgang Korngold's biographer, tells about Herbert Stothart in his YouTube channel:
Herbert Stothart is perhaps the one composer from Hollywood's Golden Age who is overlooked or if remembered at all, somewhat disparaged. This is largely due to his predilection for borrowing themes from other composers, mostly the classics, in his scores, and no matter how skilful, his music is often derided as pastiche. This has led to frequent charges of deliberate plagiarism over the years, but I think it's rather unjust.
Stothart's background was in theatre, and he was well used to taking whatever music he thought would be best suited to a dramatic situation, without credit. He was also capable of writing affecting, intensely romantic melodies, usually played by the strings in unison with considerable portamenti throughout. While many hands helped create MGM scores, it was always Stothart's name on the credits and one can usually tell which themes are his by the thick unison string scoring. Like Steiner, Korngold and Rozsa, he had his own musical fingerprint and it is very recognisable to anyone with a musical ear.
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Carroll is right that Stothart selected classical music themes which he found à propos, a method that links him to the tradition of silent film scoring rather than to Golden Age Hollywood original scoring.
In a few cases, like "The Picture of Dorian Gray", he even credits the classical piece he and his arrangers were using - something that rarely occurred.
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Posted: |
Aug 25, 2011 - 1:41 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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.....Stothart was a gifted film composer. I've seen a number of his films, and while I recall his predilection for skillfully weaving folk music in his scores I only recall a few uses of classical themes. Yet even the classical composers at times could quote their own or other's works.
The mark of a successful film score is whether the music supports and advances the film dramatically. Stothart consistently accomplished that, and his scores are superior to much of the amorphous junk and bombast accompanying films today. To brand him a silent film score "compiler" is ridiculous.....
I agree with this completely. Stothart's work has a distinct style that is recognizable immediately and I've never heard a Stothart score which didn't ALWAYS support the film---perhaps sometimes to the detriment of Stothart's fame and longevity, as we've come to see.
As yet we've had a chance to listen to very few Stothart scores which are relatively complete and "in the clear"---NORTHWEST PASSAGE, DRAGON SEED, SON OF LASSIE, THE WIZARD OF OZ, and tantalizing bits of THE YEARLING and RANDOM HARVEST. I found DRAGON SEED to be absolutely lovely---and it's in spectacular (for 1944) stereo, making it a joy to listen to!
I cannot deny that Stothart occasionally "quotes" other classical composers' work---but this is most always done with reference to the time of the original composition and the period of the film itself. It's a lot like introducing '60s tunes into the scoring of a '60s-set film, or the simple needle-drop use of contemporary pop music into EVERY film today!
The difference between Stothart and simple needle-drop utilizations is that Stothart (and Alfred Newman and Max Steiner and others of his period) takes a theme he's borrowing, re-orchestrates and re-arranges it and merges it into his own themes. (Max Steiner's original score for BEYOND THE FOREST, interpolating and arranging in myriad ways the previously-written song, "Chicago," to make important dramatic story points is a perfect example of this.) I see absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Audiences of the day "knew" these borrowed themes, understood why they were there, and never thought their use as stealing or lack of originality. They set the time and the place very quickly; They were movie shorthand that everyone accepted then, and it's one of the reasons a 90-minute movie in 1947 now runs 2 hours and 20 minutes today. 
Movies have usually tried to reflect, in all their creative aspects, the period in which the plot was set---unless they were trying for some unusual effect. Costume designers (properly, I'd say) adapt designs of the period of a film into their own original costumes for that film instead of, say, making the costumes for BEN-HUR contemporary 1959 originals or off-the-rack street clothes. Occasionally, when a studio has actually tried something new, it is not accepted. EVERYONE has always attacked the Art Direction of THE SILVER CHALICE for being, in my opinion, really quite inventive and original instead of copying and utilizing design elements from the period in which the film takes place. Ya' can't win!
As for Stothart's utilization of massive music co-writers on his films, this is an argument that detractors who have NEVER read, IN DETAIL, the internal studio music cue sheets, like to make. It is simply not true and any review of the cue sheets would verify this. When you time out, cue-by-cue, the contributions of Stothart and other on-staff composer/composers, IF ANY, you see exactly who did what, and it's virtually always in Stothart's favor. I don't believe you can name a studio of the 1930s-1950s which didn't have, on occasion, multiple composers working on their films. It happened regularly at all of them---why the venom for Stothart? (....Well, I have my suspicions about this but there's no point in stirring the pot too much.)
I have defended Stothart here as I always do.
He was a versatile composer, working on contemporary films, period films, sea epics, romantic films, musicals, adventures, westerns, scoring anything and everything in-between, including The Marx Brothers. I have never seen a Stothart-scored film in which I didn't think the score was professional, original-in-concept, melodic, well-orchestrated, thoughtful, and, considering that he was often scoring upwards of 8 films a year, amazing in execution.
But I have also always gone on to say that Stothart is (at least at this time) not one of my all-time favorites.
Perhaps, unlike Steiner or Young or Herrmann or Newman or North, he recedes into his films much more and becomes a part of them instead of standing out from them. The wonderful Hugo Friedhofer is much like this. (As an afterthought perhaps I could add that although this might be artistically smart---the submerging of your talents into the project---it might also be commercially dumb.)
Maybe one day when/if there are more full releases, we can all hear more of Stothart and make more valid decisions, and, in agreement with the original poster, I would also call for more Stothart releases.
A double-set of Dickens---DAVID COPPERFIELD and A TALE OF TWO CITIES, a Garbo set---CAMILLE, ANNA KARENINA, QUEEN CHRISTINA, an epic set---MARIE ANTOINETTE and ROMEO AND JULIET, a war-themed set---THEY WERE EXPENDABLE and THIRTY SECONDS OVER TOKYO and A GUY NAMED JOE, a Greer Garson set---MRS. MINIVER and VALLEY OF DECISION, a literary classics set---PRIDE AND PREJUDICE and THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY and THE BARRETTS OF WIMPOLE STREET, an "exotics" set--- KISMET and THE GOOD EARTH........and not forgetting THE HUMAN COMEDY, NATIONAL VELVET, EDISON THE MAN, VIVA VILLA, MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY, WATERLOO BRIDGE, CONQUEST, THEY MET IN BOMBAY, CHINA SEAS, THE WHITE CLIFFS OF DOVER.....
all these, and more, would be worthy.
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.....Stothart was a gifted film composer. I've seen a number of his films, and while I recall his predilection for skillfully weaving folk music in his scores I only recall a few uses of classical themes. Yet even the classical composers at times could quote their own or other's works.
The mark of a successful film score is whether the music supports and advances the film dramatically. Stothart consistently accomplished that, and his scores are superior to much of the amorphous junk and bombast accompanying films today. To brand him a silent film score "compiler" is ridiculous.....
I agree with this completely. Stothart's work has a distinct style that is recognizable immediately and I've never heard a Stothart score which didn't ALWAYS support the film---perhaps sometimes to the detriment of Stothart's fame and longevity, as we've come to see.
As yet we've had a chance to listen to very few Stothart scores which are relatively complete and "in the clear"---NORTHWEST PASSAGE, DRAGON SEED, SON OF LASSIE, THE WIZARD OF OZ, and tantalizing bits of THE YEARLING and RANDOM HARVEST. I found DRAGON SEED to be absolutely lovely---and it's in spectacular (for 1944) stereo, making it a joy to listen to!
I cannot deny that Stothart occasionally "quotes" other classical composers' work---but this is most always done with reference to the time of the original composition and the period of the film itself. It's a lot like introducing '60s tunes into the scoring of a '60s-set film, or the simple needle-drop use of contemporary pop music into EVERY film today!
The difference between Stothart and simple needle-drop utilizations is that Stothart (and Alfred Newman and Max Steiner and others of his period) takes a theme he's borrowing, re-orchestrates and re-arranges it and merges it into his own themes. (Max Steiner's original score for BEYOND THE FOREST, interpolating and arranging in myriad ways the previously-written song, "Chicago," to make important dramatic story points is a perfect example of this.) I see absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Audiences of the day "knew" these borrowed themes, understood why they were there, and never thought their use as stealing or lack of originality. They set the time and the place very quickly; They were movie shorthand that everyone accepted then, and it's one of the reasons a 90-minute movie in 1947 now runs 2 hours and 20 minutes today.
Movies have usually tried to reflect, in all their creative aspects, the period in which the plot was set---unless they were trying for some unusual effect. Costume designers (properly, I'd say) adapt designs of the period of a film into their own original costumes for that film instead of, say, making the costumes for BEN-HUR contemporary 1959 originals or off-the-rack street clothes. Occasionally, when a studio has actually tried something new, it is not accepted. EVERYONE has always attacked the Art Direction of THE SILVER CHALICE for being, in my opinion, really quite inventive and original instead of copying and utilizing design elements from the period in which the film takes place. Ya' can't win!
As for Stothart's utilization of massive music co-writers on his films, this is an argument that detractors who have NEVER read, IN DETAIL, the internal studio music cue sheets, like to make. It is simply not true and any review of the cue sheets would verify this. When you time out, cue-by-cue, the contributions of Stothart and other on-staff composer/composers, IF ANY, you see exactly who did what, and it's virtually always in Stothart's favor. I don't believe you can name a studio of the 1930s-1950s which didn't have, on occasion, multiple composers working on their films. It happened regularly at all of them---why the venom for Stothart? (....Well, I have my suspicions about this but there's no point in stirring the pot too much.)
I have defended Stothart here as I always do.
He was a versatile composer, working on contemporary films, period films, sea epics, romantic films, musicals, adventures, westerns, scoring anything and everything in-between, including The Marx Brothers. I have never seen a Stothart-scored film in which I didn't think the score was professional, original-in-concept, melodic, well-orchestrated, thoughtful, and, considering that he was often scoring upwards of 8 films a year, amazing in execution.
But I have also always gone on to say that Stothart is (at least at this time) not one of my all-time favorites.
Perhaps, unlike Steiner or Young or Herrmann or Newman or North, he recedes into his films much more and becomes a part of them instead of standing out from them. The wonderful Hugo Friedhofer is much like this. (As an afterthought perhaps I could add that although this might be artistically smart---the submerging of your talents into the project---it might also be commercially dumb.)
Maybe one day when/if there are more full releases, we can all hear more of Stothart and make more valid decisions, and, in agreement with the original poster, I would also call for more Stothart releases.
A double-set of Dickens---DAVID COPPERFIELD and A TALE OF TWO CITIES, a Garbo set---CAMILLE, ANNA KARENINA, QUEEN CHRISTINA, an epic set---MARIE ANTOINETTE and ROMEO AND JULIET, a war-themed set---THEY WERE EXPENDABLE and THIRTY SECONDS OVER TOKYO and A GUY NAMED JOE, a Greer Garson set---MRS. MINIVER and VALLEY OF DECISION, a literary classics set---PRIDE AND PREJUDICE and THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY and THE BARRETTS OF WIMPOLE STREET, an "exotics" set--- KISMET and THE GOOD EARTH........and not forgetting THE HUMAN COMEDY, NATIONAL VELVET, EDISON THE MAN, VIVA VILLA, MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY, WATERLOO BRIDGE, CONQUEST, THEY MET IN BOMBAY, CHINA SEAS, THE WHITE CLIFFS OF DOVER.....
all these, and more, would be worthy.
It would be wonderful to have all those Stothart releases you refer to above. A tribute to a sadly neglected composer and a special treat to all the fans of classic movies music. May FSM give us some day all the titles you suggest to be released. I enjoyed your post to the last word and fully agree with everything you say.
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Interesting post indeed, Manderley, though your comment
Audiences of the day "knew" these borrowed themes, understood why they were there, and never thought their use as stealing or lack of originality. They set the time and the place very quickly; They were movie shorthand that everyone accepted then.
again points to the silent movie music tradition, in which existing tunes were often used for that same reason (see Breill's The Birth of a Nation e.g.).
I agree that Stothart's compositions and arrangements often worked very well in the films, but from the few available sources of his music on albums it doesn't seem to stand on its own very well (perhaps due to the horrific sound of many 1930s recordings). Perhaps they do need modern recordings.
I was quoting from Previn's "No Minor Chords" with regard to the working methods at MGM.
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You mean Andre Previn, who worked in the same department for nearly two decades, did not understand its working methods? On the other hand, his book (edited by Jackie O!) is rather flippant and slipshod about details.
I agree it's flippant (which is part of the point of the enterprise, though I`d prefer nonchalant), but hardly slipshod. It doesn't pretend to be a chronicle of music at MGM, but uses several stories to shed light on the day-to-day routine Previn and other other arranger-composers had to go through, to convey the atmosphere (which the book does rather nicely). Another observation Previn makes is how well the MGM Orchestra played often very bad music (not referring to Stothart specifically!).
Personally, I'd rather trust a first-hand witness like Previn here.
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Posted: |
Aug 26, 2011 - 12:13 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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.....Interesting post indeed, Manderley, though your comment
Audiences of the day "knew" these borrowed themes, understood why they were there, and never thought their use as stealing or lack of originality. They set the time and the place very quickly; They were movie shorthand that everyone accepted then.
again points to the silent movie music tradition, in which existing tunes were often used for that same reason (see Breill's The Birth of a Nation e.g.).....
You can't be suggesting that the liberal use of quotes of classical or pop repertoire---originating in the silent age---died with Herbert Stothart, are you?
From my movie-going experience, it would seem to me that the technique obviously continues right up through 2011, but now, added to the menu of possible lifts from the classical and pop repertoire, contemporary film composers and directors are starting to tap into material from previously-written scores in the classic Hollywood film canon as well!!!
A contemporary list of films including interpolations or quotes---or a list of contemporary composers who do it---or a list of directors who include it in their films, either as direct quote or temp track subsitute---would be endless. For gosh sakes, on the FSM board we often have whole threads with posters comparing their lists of "Dis Irae" quotes! Some years ago we had a major contretemps about Franz Waxman and his Oscar-winning score for A PLACE IN THE SUN. Discussions of James Horner and his oeuvre are a regular occurrence around here and, in fact, the unfortunate, but wealthy ($$$), James Horner seems to be the contemporary Herbert Stothart in terms of general abuse. (If only Stothart had made comparable bucks in the '30s-'40s, the connection would be complete.) I don't think I've ever read a comment from Horner about this criticism of him. "F-k You" money goes a long way in ameliorating any kind of critical hurt. 
Film-god Kubrick loved the quoting technique. Sometimes it was re-arranged---BARRY LYNDON---and sometimes it was needle-drop---2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. Woody Allen uses the concept constantly. I see no slings and arrows aimed at either of these two, except comments from Alex North fans that, in the case of Kubrick, he screwed Alex North!
Singling out Stothart to make this interpolating argument continues to be a pretty feeble criticism of the man's overall work by some of today's filmmusic critics.
If you say that Stothart didn't do it well---which I would disagree with---that's within your personal critical judgment and I certainly accept it as such. But to imply that Stothart employed a technique that was only of his time, is patently false. It's a dependable and well-worn fall-back which continues today as one of the basic filmmusic patterns in usage and regularity.
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Posted: |
Aug 26, 2011 - 12:51 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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.....Another observation Previn makes is how well the MGM Orchestra played often very bad music (not referring to Stothart specifically!).....
Andre Preview is brilliant, witty, accomplished.
I love Previn's film work; He's one of my all-time favorites.
But dare I say it?:
Previn, as indicated by his writings and on-camera posturings,
is sometimes also an arrogant SOB.
One of the things I find curious is that, other than actors and actresses, the biographies and writings of film composers I've read are generally more caustic and critical and downright insulting to some of the work of their fellow creative artists than are the written words of other creative workers in the industry. Contempt often drips from the pages, but it's couched in a sometimes amusing, "Let me tell you a story," kind of way.
I've always wondered why that is.
Is it competitiveness, and wondering where the next job will come from, or is it not trusting your own creativity and thinking you'll go dry, or is it a fear of not ACTUALLY being the best, or is it, instead, a defense mechanism where ego tops sociability?
The film industry, despite thousands of people working in it, is a very limited, and privileged, business. There are, naturally, various degrees of success within the industry---some based on talent, some based on ambition, or some a combination of both. But the achievement of working for a long time in the business at all, and if you are lucky, even getting your own name printed up there on the product is a very special thing. It has always been so for me, anyway.
A fellow creator's work may not particularly appeal to me, but I've always had respect for the talent and/or ambition that got him there---and the individuality of HIS vision and how he accomplishes it seems like something that can't really be judged.
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Posted: |
Aug 26, 2011 - 2:20 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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Manderley said.....
.....As for Stothart's utilization of massive music co-writers on his films, this is an argument that detractors who have NEVER read, IN DETAIL, the internal studio music cue sheets, like to make. It is simply not true and any review of the cue sheets would verify this......
and Rozsaphile said......
.....You mean Andre Previn, who worked in the same department for nearly two decades, did not understand its working methods?.....
I once worked with a Director who told me a funny happening in his life. He had come from a very wealthy, well-known family in the US. Eventually he went out on his own and into the film business---which the family wasn't happy about---and got married and had children.
Eventually, he divorced, and his ex-wife took him to court over his failure to pay the proper amounts for child support. The family sided with the ex-wife, and while this Director had enough to pay the required amount being demanded, he didn't have a lot extra, and couldn't tap the family for help.
So, he dressed down for his court appearance, in a slightly frayed suit and old stained shirt and tie, to make his case of penury. His plea was going fairly well; He would certainly pay what he could, but more was out of the question. The judge was buying it.
Suddenly, the ex-wife stood up in court and yelled, "Look at his shoes, Your Honor! Look at his shoes!"
As everyone in court looked down at his shoes, so did he, and discovered to his dismay, that he had worn one of his new and VERY expensive handmade pairs of shoes. He lost his case.
I once shot a series of interviews in which 3-4 film workers were asked about a specific event which happened during the making of a film on which they were a part. Although each of them were there at the exact moment of the event, in true RASHOMON fashion, every one of them remembered the event in a different way, based on their creative positions and biases.
I would suggest to you that Andre Previn, who would have been a teenager in the 1940s---the time that he knew Stothart---was in a different position of knowledge and power than he was later---and, in true RASHOMON fashion, also didn't know exactly all that was going on around him, and so his memories and the salient points of his story are also colored by biases and wish-fulfillments of how the tales should go. This is not a criticism of Previn. Eventually, nearly everyone remembers things differently from how they originally occurred and are sometimes shocked by evidence proving them wrong when they are confronted with it.
"Look at his shoes, Your Honor!"
And so, I would say that the "shoes," in this case, are the internal evidence---records, schedules, and business documents that the studios turned out in massive regular doses, day-by-day. It takes only a simple perusal to see the breakdown of a score's composers and timings in an MGM cuesheet.
I have never made the argument that others didn't contribute to some of Stothart's scores. They did. But the implication and argument has always been that the others wrote MOST or even the bulk of a Stothart score, which is absolutely not true---and the cue sheets prove that.
In all this one might want to mention in the same breath another composer who I much admire, Alfred Newman, and his friend Hugo Friedhofer, who contributed major UNCREDITED set pieces to such Newman scores as THE PRISONER OF ZENDA, THE MARK OF ZORRO, AIRPORT, and THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD, among others.
Hugo also once made a veiled comment to me that Cyril Mockridge sometimes wrote "Alfred Newman" scores better than Alfred did---the implication being that the bulk of a few Alfred Newman-credited scores WERE Cyril Mockridge scores. But the reverse is true as well, and some Friedhofer, Mockridge, North, Kaplan, Amfitheatrof and other credited scores also had important uncredited original contributions by Newman.
This is the way things were done in the old factory-system Hollywood---the top people were writing scores at all the studios, on their own or even occasionally helping others---and Stothart should not be singled out for this criticism. At the top studios there were at least 50 pictures to grind out each year---one released each week. That's a big workload.
There was a time in Old Hollywood where filmmaking was a team effort, everyone tended to work together, and put the film first. Their attitude was that if they made a good product, it would continue to create business for the studio, it would reflect well on all of them, credited or uncredited, and each of them would stay in the studio's good graces and continue their careers there. In an age when the economy was not flourishing, a well-paid and permanent job, with the chance to possibly move upward, was important to many.
As for myself.....if I care for a score, and it appeals to me, and it is coherent and works within the film for which it was intended, I don't care WHO wrote the score, or even if it was a gaggle of composers, or even if it is a good stand-alone CD listen.
After several postings, I'm outta' here for the day! These posts take a long time to muse about and write.
I wish someone could help me write them.
(Of course, they will be posted under my name alone. )
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