 Catching Dreams: Preston Tucker’s Fight for Free Enterprise
by Jomana M. Papillo
He is excited by a system where deals are negotiated and profit is the reward of intelligent trading. And like most Americans, he is a sucker for a bargain. The most enticing bargain of all, however, is the American free enterprise system. What a deal: work hard to turn an idea into a profitable venture, and you will be duly rewarded. (Read more...)
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Our Greatest Living Tenor: Placido Domingo
by James Kilbourne
There is no tenor in history who has worked harder on his art than Placido Domingo. (Read more...)
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My Teacher, Myself
by Adam Buker
One of the reasons I study at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale is my professor of composition, Dr. Frank Stemper. I generally find his compositions to be abysmal and abhorrent and metaphysically grotesque. I've even stated my opinion of his and other avant-garde crap to him in class (though with a great deal of tact). I write music that is more akin to Ravel, Debussy, and Rachmaninoff. Why on earth would a person like me study with a Post-modern like him? (Read more...)
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Yes? No!
by James Kilbourne
The music is better than the booklet, but that would also be true of a four-year bubonic plague epidemic. (Read more...)
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Triumph Over Chaos
by Heidi C. Lange
Artistic nudity has long been a part of traditional artistic work, but can it ever be appropriate in photographic art? Does it cross the line into the grotesque, or can it be part of an artistic celebration of humanity? (Read more...)
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Robin Field, the Peter Pan of Reason
by Rodney Rawlings
Robin Field’s many-faceted background in light entertainment—vaudeville, impressions, acting, pantomime, radio, theater, cartooning, puppetry, and ventriloquism—makes him a fitting representative of that joyous, benevolent American sense of life which Objectivism defends. And the persona he portrays in Three Questions: A Philosophical Oratorio is like nothing so much as Disney’s Peter Pan: “fearless, laughing, confident, able, free, independent, victorious.” (Read more...)
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Liquidator or Liberator? - A Review of Jerry Sterner's Other People's Money
by Jomana M. Papillo
In Other People’s Money, playwright Jerry Sterner creates a cutthroat, predator-prey-style business world in which the key players fight for the principles on both sides of a corporate takeover. (Read more...)
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On a Bright Cloud of Music
by Eric Rockwell
Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I is both a masterpiece of the American musical theatre and a passionate portrayal of the triumph of reason. (Read more...)
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The Greatest Operatic Tenor on Record
by James Kilbourne
He can float a soft note for what seems eternity, and bring you to beautiful place of his own creation as he does it. Just as you become relaxed and appreciative of this gentle, introspective world, Jussi the hero and conqueror leaves you gasping for air and looking for your horse to join him in battle. (Read more...)
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Thursday
February 24, 2005 |
Victor Hugo's Ninety-Three
by Cameron Pritchard
Victor Hugo is best known for Les Misérables and Notre Dame de Paris, two classics of Romantic literature. But Hugo's final novel, Ninety-Three, is a work of such power, scope and passion that it ranks with the most famous of his works. (Read more...)
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Million Dollar Baby: A Moving and Memorable Morality Tale
by Bob Palin
Even though it’s been a week since I saw Million Dollar Baby, the characters and events that are portrayed therein stay with me. The emotional impact that this movie has had on me is powerful and lasting. To Clint Eastwood and everyone involved in the production of this wonderful and masterful achievement, I say thank ... (Read more...)
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Thursday
February 17, 2005 |
 Miklos Rozsa: A Singular Life
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra
Celebrating the Life and Music of Composer Miklos Rozsa (Read more...)
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Reading List: So You Want to Study Architecture?
by Peter Cresswell
So you want to study architecture? You want books and readings I might recommend for someone beginning architectural education? Here’s a ‘top twenty’ list to get you started. (Read more...)
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Tamara de Lempicka, a Howard Roark of Art
by Manfred F. Schieder
Have you ever heard of Tamara de Lempicka? She became a millionaire in her lifetime without any government grants or subsidies and worked her way up against all odds, particularly the Avant-garde “created” by mainly Marxist artists and intellectuals, best represented by that “work of art” of Kazimir Malevitch (1878-1935) known as “Black square on white background”, a feat that shattered his brain for the rest of his life. (Read more...)
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Holiday Reprise (With Extras) - Esthetics as the Barometer of the State of our Culture
by Lindsay Perigo
Editor's note: This is the first of an occasional reprise over the holiday period of earlier SOLOHQ articles. This one is inspired by the post I have quoted from Michael Newberry on a current thread here.
Respect for reason gives rise to respect for the right to exercise it - freedom. Freedom gives rise to prosperity & enormous diversity, including ideas & art works that are inimical to it. Against such ideas & art, while defending to the death their right to exist, we should be eternally vigilant. (Read more...)
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The Forgotten Romantic: Anton Bruckner
by George W. Cordero
Bruckner is demanding of his listener—he demands focus, demands concentration, demands stamina, and above all he demands commitment. One does not listen to a Bruckner symphony, one must commit to it. (Read more...)
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Machan's Musings - The Corruption of 'Law and Order'
by Tibor R. Machan
When the show began there was a healthy idealism about it. The initial story lines stressed principles not only of law but of justice. Michael Moriarity’s Assistant DA was motivated from conviction and the ideas and ideals that guided him were mostly truly valuable. ... Much of the show now is tortuously PC. (Read more...)
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'Some Day'
by Muriel Agnello
[Editor's note - the performance reviewed here is included on the twofer CD: 'Mario Lanza - Christmas Hymns and Carols: You Do Something to Me' available from amazon.com. See Derek McGovern's CD post below.]
It is probably one song that most people would include on their Lanza favorite list – automatically, without thinking, a true example of a “no-brainer” choice. What is its charm? Why does it grab the heart and hold on to it forever? Let’s take a closer look ... (Read more...)
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Wednesday
December 1, 2004 |
Objectivist Morality Anime
by Adam Reed
"The Incredibles" is an Objectivist morality tale, one that I wish had been available back when I was bringing up a child. (Read more...)
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The Master: Wilhelm Furtwangler
by George W. Cordero
There are many compilations of all of Beethoven’s 9 symphonies. I personally own 3 whole sets, and numerous individual recordings of different symphonies. When it comes to a Beethoven symphony its hard to argue against the precision of a von Karajan with the BPO. And if state of the art technology and stereo or digi... (Read more...)
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Rachmaninoff: Musical Hero
by Adam Buker
In a time when others were plunging into avant-garde, Rachmaninoff took Romantic forms and added a uniquely individualistic sense of sweeping melody that soars higher than anything I've ever seen. (Read more...)
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Puccini's "Edgar": My Brush with Immortality.
by James Kilbourne
[Editor's note - Intrigued by this article, I dug up an old CD in my collection containing the orchestral preludes to Acts 1 & 3 of 'Edgar.' The music is most certainly "glorious" ... lyrical & rhapsodic. - Linz]
On another occasion, I will write a full review of 'Edgar.' Suffice it to say that 'Edgar' contains some of the most glorious music Puccini ever wrote, and since we are talking about Puccini here, that means it contains some of the most glorious music ever written. (Read more...)
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The Night Before Yesterday
by James Kilbourne
I see that that new-but-already-classic film "The Day After Tomorrow" is being released this week on DVD. I had the honor of attending this masterpiece last June upon its theatrical release. Somewhat blinded by insight overload, the following were my thoughts upon arising the next morning: (Read more...)
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Something Better than Rage, Pain, Anger & Hurt
by Peter Cresswell
There’s nothing inherently more rational about a violin than a guitar – as Eric Clapton says, ‘It’s in the Way That You Use It!' It just so happens that over the last three centuries or three most violins have been asked to do more than have most guitars. That’s just the way it is. If art is our shortcut to philosophy then music is our shortcut to our own soul. Good music enables us to hold up a mirror to ourselves and to see what it is our own soul looks like - and it isn’t always pretty, and we’d sometimes rather not know ... (Read more...)
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Like a Man Possessed
by Chris Matthew Sciabarra
Review of Mario Lanza: An American Tragedy, by Armando Cesari (Fort Worth, Texas: Baskerville Publishers, Inc., 2004)
... (Read more...)
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