Sir James Galway

The Power of the Deadline

I set myself a goal to post one more time before 2020.  So, VOILA!  Where have I been?  It’s been two and half months!  (We are still here, we are still reading stories and delving into academic material every night.)  My “Poor Me” explanation is hastily offered at the bottom of the page.  But meanwhile, a brief review of what we’ve been learning:

Nonfiction – 

Low Earth Orbit – Oh my gosh, who wouldn’t feel elite and intellectual knowing what LOW EARTH ORBIT means?  Being able to use it in a sentence?  That is one reason my son and I loved “Building on a Dream:  The International Space Station”, written by Tamra B. Orr, published in 2018 (so essentially up to date).  We learned that anything that orbits within 1,200 miles from the earth’s surface is considered LEO.  The ISS is positioned 240 miles from the earth’s surface.  MATH PROBLEM:   1)  If the moon is approximately 240,000 miles from earth, the ISS is what percentage of that distance?  2)  If the ISS circles Earth 15.5 times daily, how many orbits are made in a year? (answers at bottom of post) 

Opera Stories – “Sing Me a Story” – a worthy book by the Metropolitan Opera that explains in great detail an array of opera stories.  Our brief synopses of the book’s synopses – 

  • Aida – SAD:  a terrible misunderstanding, lovers die at end
  • Amahl and the Night Visitors – HAPPY:  good things come to those pure of heart
  • The Barber of Seville – HAPPY:  characters in disguise, happy ending
  • La Boheme – SAD:  poverty, love, tragic death
  • Carmen – SAD:  Carmen (not a sympathetic character) comes to a bad end (a stabbing death)
  • The Daughter of the Regiment – HAPPY:  all sorts of surprises, happy ending
  • L’Enfant et les Sortilèges – HAPPY, SORT OF:  naughty boy has a change of heart
  • Die Fledermaus – HAPPY:  ever so many things going on, merry ending
  • Hansel and Gretel – HAPPY, SORT OF:  morbid fun
  • The Love for Three Oranges – WHO KNOWS:  way, way, way too confusing for the likes of us
  • The Magic Flute – HAPPY:  really long, many intertwined themes, triumphant ending
  • Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg – HAPPY, SORT OF: the trials of joining the town chorus
  • Pagliacci – SAD:  vintage opera (clowns and a stabbing)
  • Porgy and Bess – HEART WRENCHING:  drugs, gambling, murder.  Too adult for us.
  • The Tales of Hoffman – SAD:  the three weird loves of ETA Hoffman PLUS tuberculosis

Around the World – we really enjoyed every page of “Amazing Expeditions” by Anita Ganeri, superbly illustrated by Michael Mullan.  

  • Most engaging journeys – Marco Polo, Norgay and Hillary, Ellen MacArthur
  • Most likable expedition leader – James Cook
  • Most unlikable expedition leader – Hernan Cortes

Maurice Sendak – we are in the middle of a unit on American illustrator Maurice Sendak, using multiple resources.  We loved learning that among his many jobs, Sendak constructed window displays for famed NYC toy store, FAO Schwartz.  We are fascinated by the meticulous crosshatching in many of Sendak’s illustrations (and we tried our hand at crosshatching)(and we were terrible, our drawings looked like fly eyes).

Book Learnin’ – we have been giving focused attention to book anatomy:  prologue, epilogue, table of contents, and glossary.   But mostly THE TABLE OF CONTENTS.  We are astonished by what we can learn just by fully appreciating a good table of contents.  

Fiction – 

“The Best Man” – as per usual, Richard Peck writes a well-paced book we were happy to open every night.  Amid the chaos of middle-school hijinks, restoring automobiles, best friend’s mom becoming a teacher, and computer geeks, the theme of an uncle being gay is woven in seamlessly.   This is the first time I have discussed homosexuality with my son and this book made it easy.  Kudos to the late Richard Peck (he passed away in 2018).

hearts and music

Classical Music Corner – our favorite pieces that we heard for the first time in 2019:

  • Tambourin, composed by Francois-Joseph Gossec for his 1794 opera, “Le Triomphe de la Republique”.   We just LOVE this short happy piece, here played by the best:  Sir James Galway:

  • Mozart’s Oboe Concerto in C major, movement 3, composed in 1777.  Great piece:  so precise and borderline fussy:

  • Mozart’s Flute Concerto No.2 in D major, movement 3, “composed” in 1778 (it is the same thing as the Oboe Concerto, just transposed for flute – so the patron refused to pay!)  We had to have a listen:

Welcome to the best part of my day!
– Jane BH

Low Earth Orbit math problem answers:  1)  .001%  and 2)  56.6 orbits

PS  My original plan was to post twice monthly.  It is still my plan.  Here is the thing:  the past 6 months my son’s full-throttle OCD has significantly narrowed the hours I have to think, write, and post our stories and studies progress.  Please, 2020 be a nicer year than 2019.

Thousands and Thousands

Our Wonders of the World Unit: last night – giant sequoias!  The largest trees, the oldest trees (my son learned about counting rings in a slice of tree trunk to determine the age).  We love that the hugest of the huge trees have names (like “The President” and “General Sherman”).  We love that there is only one way to get an accurate measurement of the trees: a forest ecologist has to climb up to the top (some 300+ feet up, count me out).  But here is what got us thinking: a typical giant sequoia can produce up to 11,000 cones a year.  11,000!  What if they all drop at once?  Is there some sort of cone maintenance protocol?  What’s the deal here?

sequoia cones

Our George E. Ohr Unit: with great regret, we finished the A+ book on wacky, outrageous self-promoter, potter George Ohr. If you don’t know about George Ohr, here is the heartbreaker:  although he was able to support his family with the sale of his utilitarian ceramic pieces, and although his art pieces won awards at the national level, he was unable to sell ANY of his thousands of art pieces!  No one wanted them.  Fifty years after he passed on, the public “discovered” Ohr’s work and went into a buying frenzy.  There is now a fabulous George Ohr museum in his hometown of Biloxi, Mississippi, designed by an architect worthy of the project: Frank Geary.

ohr 2 ruffled ohr okeefe museum ohr book

Our Back Yard:  mistletoe has made a home in one of our oak trees, so last night we learned all about this parasite and its legends.  Then we took on a related Farmer Brown story problem.

 mistletoe clump

Our Farmer Brown Story Problem:  Farmer Brown has donated clusters of mistletoe to a local ecology club for a holiday fund raising project.  Club members are going to sell sprigs of mistletoe (packaged in cellophane bags and tied with a festive red ribbon) at the Holiday Romance Dance.  If 150 bags of mistletoe are sold at $5 each, how much profit will the club realize (remembering that although the mistletoe was free, the bolt of ribbon cost $60 and the cellophane bags cost $60)?

Our Music Theme: last night was VIRTUOUSO NIGHT starring Sir James Galway, flute player (flutist/flautist/flute player…we learned that all terms are correct, so ONE LESS WORRY).  Of note for anyone wanting to improve their flute playing skills: there are several FREE really fun master classes taught by James Galway on youtube!

We love listening to Sir James Galway:

  • Mozart’s “Concerto for Flute, Harp, and Orchestra”, movement II –  as a non-pharmaceutical means of lowering blood pressure, this piece is probably the music equivalent of an aquarium in a physician’s office.  Unhurried and soothing.  Ahhhhhh.
  • “I Saw Three Ships” – the traditional Christmas carol, so brightly played, from Galway’s Christmas CD of 1992.  The CD is still available and really, if you celebrate Christmas, you should own it.
  • Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Flight of the Bumblebee” – composed in 1899 for the opera, “The Tale of Tsar Saltan”.  How can he play this fast?  Is this played with one breath?

Welcome to the best part of my day!

– Jane BH