A Milestone and a Concert (10/7/24)

This entry hits a milestone.  Hitting a milestone is better than hitting a pothole, which I did a few weeks before trading my car for a new one.  That pothole on the eastbound shoulder of I-70 just after Kingdom City was the Grand Canyon of potholes and caused almost $5,000 in damage to the right front tire and the suspension on that corner.

So a milestone is much better.  The phrase “than hitting” contains the one-millionth word written for this series of commentaries that have kept me from finding more interesting hobbies.  It’s one small bleat in the cacophony of voices social media has allowed to flood our Holocene.

Now, to start the next million—-

A Concert of Missouri Music

Suppose we were to have a band or orchestra concert (with special performers) that featured only Missouri music.  What would you include?  Here are some suggestions. We’ve scouted out a few on Youtube.  Perhaps you can add to the list. And then, where and when should the concert or concerts be held?

Some of the artists listed have died.  But others have performed these songs.

One Warning:  Some of these things might force you to watch a fund-raising message from one or the other of our presidential candidates that you can’t get out of. OR a piece of trash about how wonderful sports betting will be for our schools.  Sorry to put you through those awful experiences.  But as British poet William Congreve wrote in 1697 about the calming effect music can have on an angry person:

Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast,

To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak.

I’ve read, that things inanimate have mov’d,

And, as with living Souls, have been inform’d,

By Magick Numbers and persuasive Sound.

What then am I? Am I more senseless grown

Than Trees, or Flint? O force of constant Woe!

‘Tis not in Harmony to calm my Griefs.

Anselmo sleeps, and is at Peace; last Night

The silent Tomb receiv’d the good Old King;

He and his Sorrows now are safely lodg’d

Within its cold, but hospitable Bosom.

Why am not I at Peace?

Now, a proposed concert:

The Missouri Waltz   (75) Johnny Cash – Missouri Waltz – YouTube

The St. Louis Blues   (75) W.C. Handy “St. Louis Blues” On The Ed Sullivan Show – YouTube

The St. Louis Blues March  (75) Glenn Miller Orchestra directed by Wil Salden – St. Louis Blues March – YouTube

A medley of the fight songs of our four-year state universities

From the movie Meet Me in St Louis: Meet Me in St. Louie, Louie; The Trolley Song; Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (also from soundtrack)

Themes from  movies: Bonnie and Clyde,  The Long Riders, Tom Sawyer (a 1973 Disney production filmed at Arrow Rock), and With a Song in My Heart (a biopic about Columbia singer Jane Froman)

Music from Big River (Roger Miller’s Broadway musical about Huck Finn)

Everything’s Up to Date in Kansas City (from Oklahoma.)

Music from The Unsinkable Molly Brown Broadway musical

Going to Kansas City ((95) “Kansas City” by Wilbert Harrison – YouTube)_

Maple leaf Rag and other Scott Joplin tunes (perhaps as a medly)

Alfred E. Brumley medley: Turn Your Radio On; If We Never Meet Again (This Side of Heaven); I’ll Meet You in the Morning; He Set Me Free; I’ll Fly Away.

Bob Dyer Songs: River of the Big Canoes (Bing Videos), Ballad of the Boonslick ((75) Ballad of Boonslick – Bob Dyer (Songteller) – YouTube); The Jim Johnson ((77) The Jim Johnson – Bob Dyer (Songteller) – YouTube); After He Painted These Walls (about the Benton mural in the capitol) (Bing Videos); Bingham’s song (Bing Videos); Jim the Wonder Dog ((77) Cathy Barton & Dave Para – “Jim the Wonder Dog Song” – YouTube)

Frankie and Johnny ((95) Frankie and Johnny by Jimmie Rodgers (1929) – YouTube)

Jesse James ((95) The Ballad of Jesse James – YouTube)

Sweet Betsy from Pike ((95) Harry McClintock – Sweet Betsy From Pike [ORIGINAL] – [1928]. – YouTube)

Walking to Missouri (1952 song about Harry Truman returning home) ((95) Carter Sisters ~ Walking to Missouri – YouTube)

They Gotta Quit Kicking My Dog Around (Bing Videos

And for the conclusion: Missouri Anthem (Neal E. Boyd of America’s Got Talent did a great rendition of what should replace the Missouri Waltz as our state song, a song composed by Brandon Guttenfelder).  Neal E. Boyd and Brandon K. Guttenfelder – MISSOURI ANTHEM – YouTube

Or a beautiful orchestral version:

Neal E. Boyd – MISSOURI ANTHEM Orchestral 2013 – YouTube

Neal E. Boyd died more than five years ago and it’s a great shame that The Missouri Anthem that he performed so magnificently is not more widely honored.  He rose from a background of poverty in southeast Missouri to achieve brief national fame as the winner of the third year of the America’s Got Talent TV show.  He died at the age of 42 from various ailments.

The song should replace the dirge adopted in 1949 by the legislature (it once was known as the Graveyard Waltz) as our state song. The bicentennial of Missouri’s permanent state capital city would be an appropriate time to do that.

Your ideas?