You're tuned to 91.7 FM, Classical Radio, KSUI in Iowa City.
Now we should have a little herald.
Ta-da!
Shiggly Mix comes your way next.
Peter, are you ready?
How can you even ask?
Here's the theme.
Hello there, I'm Peter Shiggly, and this is Shiggly Mix, a program dedicated to the proposition
that all musics are created equal, or as Duke Ellington put it, if it sounds good, it is good.
And here's a good deal. Our bills are paid by this radio station, in whose state-of-the-art studio I'm...
Well, the studio itself is state-of-the-art.
But I'm afraid I can't say the same for the roof above it.
As I guess I don't have to tell you, we've got a leak in the ceiling here,
and the worst part of it is that I can't find any large pans or anything like that around,
so I've just got a bunch of coffee cups set up on the floor.
But of course, that means I've got to empty them every few minutes or so,
and then I've got to wipe up what came down while I emptied them.
But hey, you're not a bartender, you don't have to listen to my problems.
Today's show is called H2O, Above and Below, and we're going to start off with some instrumental evocations of rain.
So how do you evoke rain musically?
Well, you... you know...
Actually, it's sort of handy having this leak in the studio right now,
because we've got the real thing being demonstrated water-wise.
Listen to those drips.
They're short, they're fairly high-pitched.
I mean, they're not bass notes.
I guess rain falling on an empty oil drum might give you bass notes,
but rain usually falls on non-resonant surfaces like ground or pavement,
in which case it simply splats, or on water, which gives you fairly high-pitched sounds.
So a composer is likely to use high-percussion instruments,
like xylophone or glockenspiel or piano,
or plucked instruments, such as harp or guitar or violin played pizzicato.
I don't think you'll find a lot of composers using the tuba to evoke rain.
Here are some nice raindrops.
¦
That's the beginning of the rain in Neue Flöte by Benjamin Britten.
Piano and xylophone there.
And then there's the element of repetition,
and of course real rain, that is, external rain,
as opposed to rain that has been filtered through the roof of this building,
has an awful lot of drops, so there's a sort of a continuous tumbling effect.
Now, as you'd expect, composers vary greatly in how literal they try to be,
as we will hear in our first suite.
It's called instrumental rain, and it's got three numbers.
You know, this dripping is beginning to get to me.
I'm going to see if I can find a rag or something like that
to stuff in that hole in the ceiling.
I'll see you in about ten and a half minutes.
¦
Instrumental Rain.
Began with a selection from Claude Debussy's
six epigraphes antiques.
I guess you should say six epigraphes antiques
or six antique epigraphes.
The last one, Pour remercier la pluie au matin,
which means for thanking the morning rain.
These were inspired by poems by Pierre-Louis.
This poem includes the lines,
¦ And I write these lines on the sand in the morning rain.
¦ The leaves are heavy with the shiny water.
¦ The rain, drop by drop, is making holes in my song.
¦ I am so sad and alone.
That was performed, that's for piano four hands,
performed by the duo Chromalink.
And then we had a selection from an album
called Good Time Ticket.
That was the Lennon-McCartney song Rain.
This was an album arranged by the host of Chick-fil-A Mix.
Half original tunes and half more famous composers
like Bob Dylan and Lennon-McCartney.
Then finally we had a piece by a very little-known now composer,
an American composer named Emerson Whithorn.
He was born in 1888 and died in 1958.
This is a piece called The Rain, Op. 12.
It was written, it's obviously quite Debussy-esque in some ways.
It was written in 1916.
That was played by John Kozar.
As you can tell, I managed to plug up that hole in the ceiling.
I couldn't find any rags, but it's pretty warm in here.
I don't really need an undershirt.
Clothes may make the man, but even without an undershirt,
I'm still Peter Shickley.
The name of the program is Chick-fil-A Mix,
from PRI, Public Radio International.
H20 above and below.
We're still on the above part talking about Rain.
Our first suite was instrumental Rain.
The next is vocal Rain,
whose four songs last about 9 1⁄2 minutes
and are in three different languages.
The first and third are in English.
The second, in translation, goes,
There is weeping in my heart like the rain on the town.
What is this languor which permeates my heart?
O soft sound of rain on ground and on roofs!
For a lonely heart, O the song of the rain!
There is crying without reason in this heart which is breaking.
What? No betrayal?
This mourning is without reason.
Indeed the worst pain is knowing not why,
Without love or hate, my heart feels such pain.
And the last song, in translation, goes,
Take the rain away from this place now.
Old man, wind, take away the rain.
Don't let the corn die, father, son.
Antarkyto is crying.
We have too many children here.
The whole place is drowning.
Stop the rain now.
In terms of precipitational evocation,
these songs vary considerably.
The fourth one that I just read the translation for
makes no attempt to imitate rain musically.
Why should it? It's praying for less, not more.
The middle two songs do evoke rain gently in their accompaniments,
whereas the first song,
well, the first song takes a more direct approach.
Oh, raindrops, so many raindrops.
It feels like raindrops falling from my eyes.
Falling from my eyes.
Since my love has left me, I'm so all alone.
I would bring her back to me,
but I don't know where she's gone.
I don't know where she's gone.
There must be a cloud in my head.
Rain keeps falling from my eyes.
Oh, no, it can't be teardrops,
for a man ain't supposed to cry.
So it must be raindrops,
so many raindrops.
It feels like raindrops falling from my eyes.
Falling from my eyes.
There must be a cloud in my head.
Rain keeps falling from my eyes.
Oh, no, it can't be teardrops,
for a man ain't supposed to cry.
So it must be raindrops,
so many raindrops.
It feels like raindrops falling from my eyes.
Falling from my eyes.
It keeps on falling.
Falling from my eyes.
It keeps on falling from my eyes.
Il pleut dans mon coeur comme il pleut sur la ville.
Et c'est de l'enfer qui pénètre mon coeur.
Au bruit d'eau de la pluie par terre et sur les toits,
il pleure un coeur qui s'enlève.
Où le chant de la pluie,
il pleure sans raison dans mon coeur qui s'éclate.
Une trahison d'endeuil sans raison.
C'est bien d'apprendre, père,
qu'il est savoir pourquoi son amour lui s'arrête.
Mon coeur attend du rêve.
Il pleut dans mon coeur comme il pleut sur la ville.
Et c'est de l'enfer qui pénètre mon coeur.
Au bruit d'eau de la pluie par terre et sur les toits,
il pleure un coeur qui s'enlève.
Il pleure sans raison dans mon coeur qui s'éclate.
Une conversation sitting in the hay. Honey, how long was I laughing in the rain?
We were gone till a thunder brought us two.
You and me underneath a roof of tin.
Pretty comfy feeling how the rain ain't beginning.
We can sit and dry just as long as it can pour.
Cause the way it makes you look makes me hope it rains some more.
You and me in rain on the roof. Caught up in a summer shower.
Drying while it soaks the flowers.
Maybe we'll be caught for hours waiting out the sun.
We can sit and dry just as long as it can pour.
Maybe we'll be caught for hours waiting out the sun.
We can sit and dry just as long as it can pour.
Vocal rain.
We began with raindrops by D. Clark.
Really nice cut.
And then we had a Fauré song.
Beautifully sung by Carol Bogard.
Accompanied by John Moriarty.
And that's the song Il pleut dans mon coeur.
Which Debussy also set.
And it was apparently Fauré himself who gave it the title Spleen.
Which is the title of another Fairland poem.
Don't get me started.
Then the third one was of course You and me in rain on the roof.
John Sebastian's song from the Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful album.
And then finally that beautiful Bolivian song.
It's from a Libana album.
And this is from a medley of Quechua songs.
I'm not sure if I'm saying that right.
Watay kuyasnin.
And that's an album called Sojourns.
Beautiful, beautiful album.
Two of those songs make the inevitable comparison
between raindrops and teardrops.
One could do a whole program of such songs.
But one won't.
It's not that...
Great.
The undershirt fell down.
Oh brother, what a mess.
Well, there's nothing I can do about it now.
Except get these coffee cups back in place.
Anyway, what I was about to say was about poetry.
About using rain as a metaphor for tears.
And poetry reminded me of a poem from my youth.
I can't remember where I learned it or who wrote it.
It goes,
The rain, it raineth on the just,
And on the unjust fella,
But mostly on the just,
Because the unjust stole the just's umbrella.
Who wrote that, anyway?
I know it wasn't John Donne.
Well, it doesn't really matter, I guess.
And in any case, it's tidbit time here in the sewers of Paris.
When I think about what this song is called,
I hesitate to put it on.
But I don't want to seem superstitious.
Besides, it'll give me three minutes and nineteen seconds
To try and plug up that hole again.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, land is parched and dry.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the rain fall from the sky.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, crops are gonna die.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the heavens cry.
When you try to make your living, making it right,
You gotta put on a real good show, tell the people anything.
You gotta get the Lord's attention, any old way you can.
Maybe he'll show a little mercy and start crying for the land.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, land is parched and dry.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the rain fall from the sky.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, crops are gonna die.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the heavens cry.
Some say I work miracles, some say I'm just insane.
Many a time I bet my life I could make it rain.
One time I had a whole town beating drums and singing through the night.
And would watch the morning sun come up without a rain cloud in sight.
I knew if I didn't make some weather and see them storm clouds gather,
I'd be run out of town when the sun went down, covered up with tar and feather.
Well I was on my knees and I raised my hands to the heavens high.
Felt the rain like a sigh of relief would come a-pouring from the sky.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, land is parched and dry.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the rain fall from the sky.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, crops are gonna die.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the heavens cry.
Let the good rain fall now.
Sometimes I don't know if it's a blessing or a curse.
Too little rain's just not enough. Too much just make things worse.
Well the good Lord promised me a miracle in this life with only one condition.
He said, take your money, get out of town, and don't try and start another religion.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, land is parched and dry.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the rain fall from the sky.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, crops are gonna die.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, make the heavens cry.
Rainmaker, rainmaker, rainmaker.
Rainmaker.
I'll bet you had figured out that that was the name of that song.
It's performed by Ed Norman, John Newland, and Mona Scheibler,
who are members of a group called the Solstice Assembly.
The album is called Under the Drawbridge. Nice eclectic bunch of stuff.
And once again, we are dripless here in our state-of-the-art studio.
I guess if I can get along without an undershirt, I can get along without underpants too.
I just hope it holds this time because that's as far as I'm going.
Hi, I'm Peter Schickele, star of Peter and the Underwear Wolf,
and the program is called Schickele Mix from PRI, Public Radio International.
Okay, let's move from the H2O above to the H2O below,
and consider in song the water in the ground.
I call this next suite the Hope for Springs is Eternal song cycle.
It's got three numbers, the middle of which is in German.
The translation of that song reads, just a second here.
You little green o'ergrown spring, where recently I Daphne saw,
your water was so still and clear, and Daphne's picture in it so fair.
If she again comes to your bank, then capture her fair image fast,
then furtively I'll sneak with moist glances to tell her image of my woe.
Once I am close, face to face, then nothing, alas, nothing can I say.
So this guy obviously isn't interested in water, qua water at all.
He just wants a reflection of his heartthrob that he can talk to,
because when he tries to talk to her in person, he goes all marshmallow.
The first and third songs share more than a common language, which is English.
They share a lot of things due to the fact that they're the same song.
Or are they? Be back in about ten minutes.
All day I faced a barren waste without the taste of water, cool water.
Oh, Dan and I with throats burnt dry and souls that cry for water, cool, clear water.
Keep a-movin', Dan, don't you listen to him, Dan.
He's the devil, not a man, and he spread the burning sand with water.
Dan, can you see that big green tree where the water's runnin' free
and it's waitin' there for me and you?
The nights are cool and I'm a fool, each star's a pool of water, cool water.
But with the dawn I'll wake and yawn and carry on to water, cool, clear water.
Keep a-movin', Dan, don't you listen to him, Dan.
He's the devil, not a man, and he spread the burning sand with water.
Dan, can you see that big green tree where the water's runnin' free
and it's waitin' there for me and you?
The shadows sway and seem to say, tonight we pray for water, cool water.
And way up there he'll hear our prayer and show us where there's water, cool, clear water.
Keep a-movin', Dan, don't you listen to him, Dan.
He's the devil, not a man, and he spread the burning sand with water.
Dan, can you see that big green tree where the water's runnin' free
and it's waitin' there for me and you?
Dan's feet are sore, he's yearnin' for just one thing more than water, cool water.
Like me, I guess he'd like to rest where there's no quest for water, cool, clear water, cool, clear water.
Du kleine, grünen, wachsen Källe, An den ich da verjüngst gesehen,
Dein Wasser war so still und helle, Und dachten es wild darin,
Und dachten es wild darin, so schön, Und dachten es wild so schön.
Oh, wenn sie sich noch mal am Ufer sehen lässt, So haltet du ihr schönes Bild doch fest,
Ich gleiche heimlich dann mit nassen Augen hin, Die Wild' meine Not zu klagen.
Denn wenn ich bei dir selber bin, Dann, ach, dann kann ich ihr nichts sagen.
All day I have faced the barren wasteland Without a taste of water,
cool water.
Oh, then our throats lay dry, Our spirits cry out for water,
cool, clear water, cool, clear water.
We parted then, some devils had a plan, Very poisonous and sad, no, don't get me wrong, It's in the water, cool, clear water.
In my mind I see a big green tree, And a river flowing free,
Waiting up ahead for you and me, Water, cool, clear water.
The nights are cool and I'm a fool, Each star's a pool of water,
pool of water.
Come the dawn, we carry on, We won't last long without water,
cool, clear water.
Keep on moving, we're still in no man's land, Dry bones and sand, people never plan here for water,
cool, clear water.
In my mind I see a big green tree, And a river flowing free,
Waiting up ahead for you and me, Water, cool, clear water.
The shadows wake, the sea sleep, Tonight we pray for water,
water.
Stand way up, if you can, Please show us where there's good water,
water.
Cool, clear water.
The Hope for Springs is Eternal song cycle.
Began with the Sons of the Pioneers singing Cool Water, one of their big classics.
Then we had a short Schubert song, An Eine Quelle, which is translated here to a source.
I think a more modern English translation would be to a spring.
That was Dietrich Fischer-Diskau, accompanied by Gerald Moore.
And then finally, Joni Mitchell, from the album Chalk Mark and a Rainstorm, doing Cool Water.
And what I meant, of course, by is it the same song, is that she has revised some of the lyrics.
In her version, some of the lyrics go, Keep on moving, Dan,
Some devil's had a plan, Buried poison in the sand,
Don't drink it, man, It's in the water,
Cool, clear water.
But come the dawn, we carry on, We won't last long without water,
Cool, clear water.
Keep moving on, Dan, We're still in no man's land,
Dry bones and sand, People never planned here for water,
Cool, clear water.
And it ends, And way up there, if you care,
Please show us where there's good water,
Cool, clear water.
It also has some different chords from the original version.
It's an extremely different version, very effective.
You know, until I played this thing now, both these versions,
I always thought this song was called Cool, Clear Water,
even though that's part of the refrain.
It's actually called Cool Water.
The reason this makes a difference to me
is that I once wrote a piece for Walter Trampler,
a fine violist.
It was a jazz piece for, or a jazzy piece,
for Viola di Mori and a few other instruments,
and I called the piece Cool, Clear Walter.
So now I've got to wonder, should I go back
and change the name of that piece to Cool Walter?
I have to think about that one.
Well, we've dealt with water in all sorts of ways here.
We've heard rain imitated.
We've heard about rain we want and rain we don't want.
We've heard about water as a mirror
and what's happening to our groundwater
and where the devil fits in.
Let's hear a song that treats water completely metaphorically.
This is from a film in which the man
has been getting the cold shoulder
from the woman all along.
At one point, they get caught in a thunderstorm,
and while they stand there getting soaked,
the man, played by Leonard Sly,
who also wrote the song, by the way,
serenades the woman thusly.
¦
¦ There's a girl in this world
¦ That is singing the blues
¦ She's upset, cold and wet
¦ From her head to her shoes
¦ She was sweet, very sweet
¦ And she couldn't be beat
¦ But she's all wet now
¦ I can see, plainly see
¦ That she's thinking of me
¦ If she tried to get dry
¦ Oh, how happy we'd be
¦ She was such a pretty girl
¦ When her hair was in a curl
¦ But she's all wet now
¦ When she was just a little tot
¦ Said mother to her daughter
¦ I want you to learn to swim
¦ But don't go near the water
¦ So she disobeyed her ma
¦ Went near it anyhow
¦ She got all wet and you can bet
¦ She's paying for it now
¦ She keeps walking the floor
¦ And the time's passing by
¦ She's as wet as can be
¦ And ready to cry
¦ She had a girlie's charm
¦ When she was dry and warm
¦ But she's all wet now
¦ A-li-o-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti-lu-ti
¦ There's a girl in this world
¦ That is singing the blues
¦ She's upset, cold and wet
¦ From her head to her shoes
¦ She was sweet, very sweet
¦ And she couldn't be beat
¦ But she's all wet now
¦ I can see, plainly see
¦ That she's thinking of me
¦ If she tried to get dry
¦ Oh, how happy we'd be
¦ She was such a pretty girl
¦ When her hair was in a curl
¦ But she's all wet now
¦ When she was just a little tot
¦ Said mother to her daughter
¦ I want you to learn to swim
¦ But don't go near the water
¦ So she disobeyed her ma
¦ Went near it anyhow
¦ She got all wet and you can bet
¦ She's paying for it now
¦ She keeps walking the floor
¦ And the time's passing by
¦ She's as wet as can be
¦ And ready to cry
¦ She had a girly charm
¦ When she was dry and warm
¦ But she's all wet now
¦ Aliololololotie
¦ Aliolololotie
Leonard Sly, who by this time
had changed his name to Roy Rogers,
singing She's All Wet Now, a song he wrote for the movie Southward Ho, Brother of Dawn.
We have a little time left here, so I'm going to throw one more tune in here.
This is a tune that just goes to show that it can have a name that has to do with rain
that doesn't have anything to do with rain whatsoever in terms of evocation of rain.
As a matter of fact, I get a big kick out of this because this is a Billy Strayhorn
tune.
This is Duke Ellington and his famous orchestra.
The tune is called Rain Check.
Composers often get asked by interviewers, what did you mean by this piece or what did
you have in mind in writing this piece?
Mostly composers have music in their mind when they write pieces.
Apparently, somebody, that somebody being Stanley Dance, was interviewing Strayhorn
and he asked Strayhorn about Rain Check.
Here's Strayhorn's answer.
That was about rain, about being in California.
I was sitting at home in Los Angeles and writing.
Thanks a lot, Billy.
That really clears a lot of things up.
Here it is.
This
♪
Rain Check by Billy Strayhorn.
That was Duke Ellington and his famous orchestra,
recording from 1941.
Well, our time is about up.
Sorry for the difficulties today, folks,
but at least that second time I plugged up the hole in the ceiling, it held,
so we had a fairly uninterrupted show.
Uh, of course, actually,
if there was water dripping out of that hole in the ceiling,
and I plugged the hole up,
it means that the water has been collecting.
Oh, man.
♪
And that's yet another sickly mix down the drain.
Our program is made possible with funds provided by this radio station and its members.
That's you. Thank you all.
We'll tell you in a moment how you can get an official playlist
of all the music on today's program with record numbers and everything.
Just refer to the program number.
This is program number 61.
And this is Peter Shickley saying goodbye
and reminding you that it don't mean a thing
if it ain't got that certain je ne sais quoi.
You're looking good. See you next week.
♪
If you'd like a copy of that playlist I mentioned,
send a stamped self-addressed envelope to Sickly Mix.
That's S-C-H-I-C-K-E-L-E, Sickly Mix.
Care of Public Radio International, 100 North 6th Street, Suite 900A,
Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55403.
P-R-I, Public Radio International.