貝九與拉二

上中國綱站聽音樂，經常都看到綱友說”貝九”和”拉二”等。起初真是摸不着頭腦，看多了才知到那是指貝多芬第九交響樂和拉赫曼尼諾夫第二鋼琴協奏曲的簡 稱。 其實寫簡稱沒有什麼大不了，但不可以懶到不寫一次全稱。貝多芬一生亦有三十二首鋼琴及十首小提琴奏鳴曲，難道貝九不可以是第九鋼琴奏鳴曲 或第九小提琴奏鳴曲？突然之間想起芬蘭作曲家西貝流士，如果要說他的第七交響樂，難道我們要說”粗口”？老外也經常用簡稱，但通常是先寫全名，再寫簡稱， 例如： Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 (Choral)。似後就有Choral來說”貝九”，我不是挑骨頭，但至少要求個清楚明白而已。

說起”拉二”，不下聽了六七個板本，但我以為少年時用低質音響聽的黑膠板魯賓斯坦和芝加哥交響樂團最好，很多人覺得很好的阿殊肯納齊(Vladimir Ashkenazy)和倫敦交響樂團版本，我就覺得鋼琴部份沒有魯賓斯坦那種震撼，這也許是個人觀感而已。近年很紅的中國琴手郎郎也有奏”拉二”，最近也有下載，要找時間來聽一聽。這協奏曲可算是鋼琴師的指定動作，比較有名的鋼琴師，總要職業生涯演奏這曲一次。我在Amazon中看到太多版本多，放棄了去算有多少個。

又，數年前跟一學音樂的朋友閒談，才發覺魯賓斯坦是Artur Rubinstien，不是Arthur。這是老外圈中也經常犯錯....

陳寧《酒紅色的心》

越上網越對中國現代流行曲失望。中國有一大班高質素的歌手，只是欠缺創作，往往翻唱港台七八十年代的作品。蓋歌曲舒發感情，都以原創為真為誠，翻唱若不拿 捏好原歌情感，雖有優美歌候，騷隔靴之痒，焉能動人之容。就以梁玉嶸翻唱葉振棠的《忘盡心中情》為例，梁的粵劇唱腔中氣十足，可唱出人所不能的高難度曲 調，但欠奉《蘇乞兒》的蒼桑感。這令我想起Maria Callas，她不是可唱最高音最高難度的soprano，但她的dramatic gift令她成為廿十世紀最有名的女高音。

陳 寧的這張《酒紅色的心》又是一例，看封面還以為是結他演奏一些經典名曲。我最近聽了大多中國歌手的翻唱歌曲， 原本是以為聽演奏可以調劑一下的。翻唱不要緊，崔岩光 的翻唱就很好。可是這ＣＤ的編曲一味走簡單樂器的判奏，這就將重擔放在歌手本身。唱《明天你是否依然愛我》還可以，但唱徐小鳳原唱的《順流逆流》有就點那 個，我不知道陳寧在樂壇有多少 年，但我聴”不經意在這圈中轉到這年頭”就沒有那種味道。

Translation

Here is an article about translation of a brand name. I always fascinated about how someone can come up with a good translated name. Here is some of my addition:

Revlon = 露華濃
Oracle = 甲骨文

I think 露華濃 is from 李白's 清平調之二:

雲想衣裳花想容，春風拂檻露華濃；
若非群玉山頭見，會向瑤臺月下逢。

What the Bleep Do We Know

"What the #$*! Do We (K)now!?" has been such a successful low-budget half-fiction/half-documentary movie that it becomes quite a controversy in coffee-shops, discussion groups, etc. I heard the DVD release has been quite a success too. In a recent Buddhism retreat by Sabchu Rinpoche, we had a quite some discussion about it. I think the movie is quite inspiring but the producers have been accused of putting materials out of context. Wikipeida has an article about it. I am not especially comfortable with the story of native Indians inability to see the Spanish ship when Columbus arrived to the Caribbean Sea. In the movie, Dr. Candace Pert is saying that ".... That's why I believe the Indian Ship story...". I think there must be a series of elaboration before she said this. Unfortunately, the producers edited out too much materials. The movie editors let Dr. David Alert, one of the scientists, complains and his annoyance can be seen in here.

殷承忠《花月夜》

一 直以來都覺得用西洋樂器演奏中國音樂有另一番風味，最近才有機會聽到這張鋼琴的嘗試。封面說殷承忠是鋼琴大師，我寡聞而不知殷承忠的資歷，但我很喜歡他的 演奏。唐滌生調寄《春江花月夜》的《劍合釵圓》，更是出色，難怪用《花月夜》作為這ＣＤ的題目了。推薦：《春江花月夜》，《彩雲追月》，《十面埋伏》。

Local Hero

I consider the movie "Local Hero" (港譯：「小鎮風波」) ten years ahead of its time. It is released in 1982. I think I saw it around 1986 in the movie theater "Columbia Classics" (新華) in the "unreclaimed" harbor shore of Wan Chai (灣仔). Those were the days where I could still spent HKD 20 to see a movie and they had a unique policy of giving 20% off discount to student at 12:30pm & 2:30pm show. I was still in high-school then. I always skipped class on Friday afternoon to see the so-called "art house" movie in "Columbia Classics". I was told it closed down years ago. I guess the "art house" doesn't really have a market in Hong Kong now.

In the movie, a lonely Texan oil professional was assigned by his boss to visit countryside Scotland for the site of the future base of his oil company. Local residents were on the leash by their humble living and they surely welcomed the rag-to-rich scheme by this oil man's plan to purchase their land. They didn't make the deal because of the refusal of one big ragged humble land owner. His reason was the beautiful stars he saw at night would be gone if his homeland was turned into an oil base. The environmental activist view is at least 10 years ahead of most people or 20 years ahead of Hollywood until I saw "The Day after Tomorrow" last year. I guess the "Local Hero" in the movie is this tenacious land owner.

The sound track is produced by Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits, a Scottish band. He made such a beautiful music where the theme sound is replayed again and again.

林志美《隨浪》

在香港八十年代中，林志美可算是被忽略的一位創作女歌手。非因她的歌曲不好，只是追不上當年所吹日本的形像包裝風。她的代表作有「你的眼神」、「甚麼是緣份」、「偶遇」等等。但我喜歡林志美比較少受主目的快板歌曲「隨浪」。這可能是我喜歡電影Local Hero（港譯：「小鎮風波」）的原故，「隨浪」是取自這電影的主題曲，由蘇格蘭樂隊Dire Straits的Mark Knopfler所作，我想他也蠻喜歡這配樂，在一次Dire Straits的演唱會中，他用這配樂作壓軸。

Super Size Me

I saw "Super Size Me" on July 3. I consider the documentary a horror movie not because of it low-budget production quality nor genre but its scary warning about what you eat. In USA, as a lazy person, we eat as convenice as possible. Our lovely golden arch is just around the corner, I just need to stop by, pop up five bucks and it can satisfy my hungry ghost reincarnation for a few hours every day. Good deal! Isn't it? But as one eats from them continuously, one is over-nutrient without exercise (e.g. drive all the time without walking like most of the non-Californian). One is destined to look like Jabba the Hutt. I guess the advance of civilization benefits us this luxury. There are a few facts need to be reminded:
1. The hosts ate for 30 days in pure McDonald meals. Before the meals, he was in perfectly good health but just after ONE week, he gained 12 pounds. All his doctors mentioned about his deteriorated health and advised him to stop as soon as he can.
2. He ordered super size ONLY IF he was asked. He ordered only 7 times over the time-span. But as calculated from nutritionist, he almost ate one pound of sugar every day for these 30 days.
3. The Big Mac guy in Arizona never eat french fries. So, I guess if you want to sustain a McDonald meal, don't eat fries.

梁玉嶸《知音梁品》、《十愛》

廣州粵劇界著名紅伶梁玉嶸有良好的唱腔及歌藝。最近聽了她唱流行曲的專輯《知音梁品》及《十愛》，郤有難以形容的不足之感。這把歌喉是沒話說的了，可惜編曲都是千篇一律,歌詞輕快時沒有輕快，悲壯時沒有悲壯，拾像是工廠出產的罐頭，糟蹋了這把聲音。加上大部份是重唱香港黃金七八十年代的金曲，可見創作人才的凋零。廣東近年有一批出色的女歌手，但創作部份追不上，香港近十年來的粵詞流行曲也走下坡，歌手們變成廣告代言人，可嘆。