The Ears Of Texas Are

…relieved, after Judas Priest unexpectedly canceled their Houston gig a couple days back.

I saw Priest in 1986(?) in Austin, and that concert got me to wear earplugs to concerts ever thereafter.

Let me tell you:  I played in a loud rock band for ten years before that, and Judas Priest were LOUD.  My ears rang for about four days after the show.

I am frankly amazed that these old farts can still play the shows they do, ditto the Rolling Stones etc. (but not the Eagles, who are pretty much just a mime gig nowadays, apparently).

More power to them, say I, although perhaps the last thing the Priest need is more power.

All that said, I myself have often said that I would (still) love to play in a band — just not a rock band;  been there, done that, got the tinnitus.  But put me in a quiet little dinner-dance restaurant, playing old 1940s and -50s standards and ballads, preferably in a trio (piano, bass, and Drummer Knob on drums) with a torch singer like Julie London or Diana Krall… I’d be the happiest septuagenarian in history.

I still miss playing in a band.

Classical Exit

When I talked about which song you’d like to hear on your deathbed, I was of course referring to the spirit of the initial poll, which asked Brits which popular song they’d like to hear as they shuffled off this mortal coil.

No mention of classical music, of course, which didn’t stop several of you from listing your classical choice.

But in the spirit of that, here are my Top 5 Choices for Classical Deathbed Music — the music I’d want to hear in my last conscious awareness — and there are five only because I don’t want to list fifty (which I could), and in any event, I find it absolutely impossible to pick only one.  Any one of the following would be just fine by me, and all I can say is that I’d sorely miss hearing the other four.

Faure’s Requiem (appropriately enough)

Beethoven’s 7th Symphony, 2nd Movement

Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody On A Theme Of Paganini

Chopin’s Nocturnes

Strauss’s Die Fledermaus Overture (just a short piece, in case it’s all I’d be able to have, and Zubin Mehta conducting the Vienna Phil?  Worth every moment.)