Jenkins retiring

NBC's Bob Jenkins officially announced his retirement during Carburetion Day at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. And contrary to published reports, Mr. Jenkins, who turns 65 in September, will officially call it a career at the IZOD IndyCar World Championships September 15 in Fontana. As we come closer to Fontana, we'll collect a Bob Jenkins archive. ◙

Classic Sports Thursday

Classic Sports Thursday this time goes to a legendary piece of lore, the 25th anniversary of a deceptively titled event.
 
After two normal events, NASCAR's All-Star Race (as it is now called; because of federal tobacco regulations the title T. Wayne Robertson called the event from 1985-2003 is not legal; the Nextel years adopted the name “All-Star Challenge,” but the popular generic term of the race was adopted formally by Sprint in 2008) http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2012/05/16/all-star-pass-that-wasnt/ It was in All-Star Race III that the lore of this event began. A 202.5-mile event, the 75/50/10 format's desperation ten-lap shootout became the stories of lore. ABC televised the event, and after dominating the day, Bill Elliott was in trouble in the final ten-lap dash. During the middle of this race, a famous trip across Charlotte grass took place, and a piece of lore that for 25 years continues to be part of its legacy continues to this day.
 
Here was Keith Jackson's call of the Pass in the Grass:
 

Ten lap dashes are a part of motorsport lore. This was the one that made ten-lap dashes fun.

Note: Through a missions auction in 2000, the author purchased tickets to All-Star Race XVI, which was the last edition with two legends, and had one of the most famous finishes to the race of all-time. ◙

Survival Sunday

I don't think I've seen anything like it on television, but Sunday is football's Survival Sunday, and seven of the ten games in the Premiership will air live on television Stateside, while three games are streamed online. All seven televised games have importance.

To think about it, imagine the NBA using a system where the top two teams in the East and West in the D-League advance to the NBA, and the bottom two teams in each conference are dumped to the D-League. In that case, it would be Charlotte and Washington (East) and New Orleans and Sacramento (West) to the D-League, while Austin and the D-Fenders (Los Angeles) (West) and Springfield, MA and Bismarck, ND (East) replace the two dumped teams in the NBA for next year.

Wolverhampton and Blackburn are dumped. 38 points are needed to avoid relegation.

It's Survival Sunday, seven games broadcast on Disney and News Corp channels combined make this bigger than Week 17 of the NFL, when only five games air on their final day of the season, and the Thursday night game is not available locally.

The dangers of Obama's sell-out to sexual deviants

Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination. (KJV)" -- Leviticus 18:22

If it isn't clear the President is now siding with sexual deviants' and their right to change marriage in order to advance their agenda that has successfully seen new speech codes, the DSE/SRD, new benefits for homosexual couples, and sexual predators being protected, the report in The Washington BLEEP proved at a clip of one out of six major-dollar donors are sexual deviants, all of whom want to violate the aforementioned verse in the Bible.

The sexual deviancy lobby's playbook has been exposed for years. Rep. Herlong nearly 50 years ago noted the Communist Goals included normalising the deviant behaviour. They aren't playing by the rules; they want dictatorships that rewrite the rules to favour them, and punish everyone else. Our fundamental freedoms do not matter to them; they want a dictatorship, a New World Order, where they are the superior class and everyone else must bow to them.

Shepard-Byrd, rammed down using the defence authorisation act tactics in 2009, was an example of the loss of freedom of speech and religion. Any speech that a sexual deviant declares hateful (mainly caused by it being from the Bible) can now be reported as hate speech and the speaker be charged with a federal hate crime, effectively making "equal justice under the law" changed to "arbitrary justice based on" various special groups based on race, religion, or "sexual orientation" of criminals and victims, as Sen. DeMint referenced. As we've seen in other nations, it has been used on the Bible. Swedish minister Åke Green was prosecuted for preaching sexual deviancy was a sin in violation of the aforementioned verse. Alberta minister Stephen Boissoin was prosecuted for saying the truth about the sexual deviancy activists' agenda. Churches were punished in 1954 by then-Representative Lyndon B. Johnson, who used laws to block churches from discussing national issues in order to punish his opponents. With 2009's Shepard-Byrd, it's open season.
The second major point of the sexual deviants' agenda that the President has endorsed is to curtail the church itself. For many years, churches have run foster care and adoption agencies, and established homes for at-risk youth that develop these children into positive role models. We saw in states where false "marriage" was legalised that churches have lost the right to establish such agencies, and the government has total control. In the past, the church helped those in need, and liberals want it to be the government. What can the church do if the government states because they do not believe in the values of the state (which is the sexual deviants' agenda), they must shut down their ministries and their teachings are criminal under federal hate crime statues?

You call this a prayer event?

I was outraged by what I heard during Thursday's National Day of Prayer Mayor's Prayer Breakfast. Instead of discussing faith and the power of prayer, the speaker, a long-serving Democrat legislator (there are no Republicans elected to any local office -- the Left has had a 20-year winning streak), instead started pushing the virtues of government, the class warfare tract, and even discussed the goodie bags given at major events. It lacked any Biblical thought at all. It had the makings of an Occupy Wall Street rally speech, and was not suited for a prayer event.

If this does not show how the Left would rather promote Occupiers, Class Warfare, and all sorts of "social gospel" that does not include the Bible at a National Day of Prayer event, this should be a warning that the Left will hijack any event to advance their evil, anti-Christian agenda. ◙

Retro TV Friday

Leave it to Total Nonstop Action Wrestling to use their "superstars" to promote their British rights holder's revival of the Goodson-Todman game show "Blockbusters" that had successful runs in both the United States (Bill Cullen) and in the United Kingdom (Bob Holness most notably). While it's the one versus one format with adults, much unlike the classic one versus pair format and the teenage contestants in the Holness (UK) version, see if you can detect a reference to a certain part of the game at the end. The original Goodson concept was interesting and would be better than the trash television that airs today. ◙

This Just In

CHURCH ORGANISTS, SINGERS, AND MUSIC LEADERS, INCENSED BY REPEATED USE OF KARAOKE AND INAPPROPIRATE MATERIAL, DELIVER ULTIMATUM TO CHURCH MUSIC LEADERS

CHARLESTON, SC – Organists at many conservative theological churches, irate at leaders' arrogance and requests to replace the church organist with $200 karaoke DVD's with the latest pop tunes from the Michael Jackson Library, Vivendi, or Warner Music Group, and even replacing the choir with teenagers gyrating to the latest secular pop music inappropriate for churches, have, along with fellow choral members who sympathise with them, announced a major statement against the rash of prerecorded church music that has become a rampant problem in today's houses of worship. Various classically trained singers, choral leaders, and musicians signed the statement.

The statement reads:

WHEREAS, the trends in church music pushed by the secular music publishing companies has been to eliminate the sacred Biblically inerrant songs that induce people into the basic fundamentals of faith,

WHEREAS, the modern worship songs used in churches are devoid of doctrine or theology, and can be sung in a bar more often than a church,

WHEREAS, the material is provided with a karaoke DVD that eliminates the job of the organist and allows the church music leader to focus on conducting the choir based on the pop, rock, or country beat of the music,

WHEREAS, other church music officials have replaced the choir in many events with youth dancing to similar popular tunes (often secular) heard on the radio today,

WHEREAS, the correct music of the church is not that of the self-help or the secular popular tunes that are rampant in today's churches, including Haugen-Haas, Sony, the Michael Jackson Estate, Vivendi, Warner Music Group, or other secular publishing houses, that are not based on the Bible but instead on people's feelings,

AND AS A RESULT, the church organist of serious Bible-teaching music is being phased out in favour of the inappropriate karaoke,

BE IT RESOLVED, AT THIS MEETING OF THE ASSOCIATION OF CHURCH MUSICIANS,

That all new contracts churches offer with organists install a prohibition of rock bands and folk instruments from church services, the prohibition of secular and other music that does not meet sound doctrine and theological standards replacing sacred songs, and a prohibition of pre-recorded music from all church services. The Association also requests the development of church choirs from youth to adult to sing sacred works of the entire church calendar, and not of the feelings-based “modern” gospel music that has been prevalent for the past one hundred fifty years.

Due to Circumstances Beyond Our Control...

We've had some difficulty with the link to the site over the last week or so. We're working to correct this, and hopefully we'll have some new content up in the next week or so. Rest assured, it's not because we've run out of things to say! ◙

Dick Clark tribute: The Gamer

We know Dick Clark from his time in pop music, especially on American Bandstand, and the tributes in light of his death have favoured his pop music career. However, for me, as I grew up in the 1980's, and our ABC affiliate (WOLO) was notoriously weak and would skip Bandstand in favour of Crockett Wrestling, we'd use the Charleston or Augusta affiliates to get the show, but I wasn't into pop music (and still isn't, considering my classical music background). But it was some days watching the various forms of Pyramid that made me think of Dick Clark first as a game show host. We know him from Pyramid, but I remember him from hosting three other games, The Challengers (1990), Scattergories (1993), and the domestic version of The National Lottery Winning Lines (2000), and produced one of the more nerve-racking shows on television history, Greed (1999-2000), which came after college graduation and in a fall of frustration where I was humiliated to a bad point of watching losers every week, I badly wanted to see winners and even damaged things watching that show!

But there were other game formats he hosted that weren't as well-known (and I wasn't born then or was too young to remember) -- The Object Is (1963), Missing Links (1964), and The Krypton Factor US (1981).

And this doesn't include all the pranks on Bloopers and Practical Jokes, the various music awards shows (with the MDA Telethon falling under R. A. Clark for the first time this fall), and even the original Star Search as judge for his old partner in crime Ed McMahon.

For some reason, Clark was best at nerve-wracking game shows, either hosting or producing.

1963 (The Object Is): Dick's first game show.

1981 (The Krypton Factor): One of two British formats hosted by Mr. Clark, neither lasted long. A mentally tough game, this summer series crowned its champion, and the top two went to Britain to face the British top two of that year. The British won.

Retro TV Friday

The recent announcement that the utter disgrace known as MTV2 is producing a hip-hop themed version of a Heatter-Quigley classic that we've discussed over the years reminded me of this zinger from ten years ago on the 1998-2004 version of that very show.

I don't think whoever gets that disgraceful version will ever come to the standards of this 2002 episode. My, have times changed! (And I don't just mean the value of a win either!)  ◙

Classic Sports Thursday

A recent tweet at the Michigan International Speedway reminded me of this Kmart vs Target 2000 battle in CART's FedEx Championship Series between Michael Andretti and Juan Pablo Montoya that thrilled the battle in one of the more exciting races during The Split II.

At a recent tire test at the two-mile speedplant, Mr. Montoya sent this:

"Pouring here in Michigan. Track needs a jet dryer. They used to have one, but somebody blew it up!" ◙

Here is your first subject - GO!

Sad news

I am much more aware and defensive than I used to be. It's true. Everbody is out to get you. They don't know those are lethal weapons, those automobiles." -- George Vescey, quoting from Barbara Mandrell in her biography he wrote, Get to the Heart (1990).

As I woke up Sunday morning readying myself for church after a tiring Saturday (still sore from a half), I receive word from a singing friend of a local singer's death. After checking with a few others, I later confirmed it was the bass from last year's Messiah singalong, Wesley Brax, who had been killed in a two-vehicle collision in Ripley County, IN near Versailles State Park. The 23-year old Cincinnati student's car lost control in the rain, slid sideways, and crashed into a larger car. The smaller car's monocoque was smashed where the driver was killed instantly.

Prayers go out to the Brax family. Such a wonderful singer with a wonderful future snuffed out in an instant in that tragic crash. Wesley had performed at the Tanglewood Music Festival last season, and was set for a return engagement this summer.

Our Word Remembers the life of a young baritone on his way up . . . ◙

Opera Wednesday

You're likely to be reading a lot about the Titanic this week if you haven't already, and you're likely to read more about it on this site before the week is over. But for today, a curious tie-in between the Titanic and Opera Wednesday.

The Titanic's orchestra has long since entered the realm of history for playing throughout the sinking, until the ship itself went under. Much of the discussion surrounds what the band actually played at the end, which is another story altogether. But music holds a strong power of identification in human memory, and it is enough for a few bars of a tune to be played to bring back instantly all the feelings, hopes and fears of a single moment of time. And so it was with the final piece that the orchestra played in their concert in the first class reception room that night. It was the last piece that anyone would hear until the Titanic's encounter with the iceberg, and for Noël Leslie, the Countess of Rothes, it created a memory she would never forget.

That night the orchestra played the Bacarolle from Offenbach's Tales of Hoffmann. It is a haunting piece of music, and when viewed in context of the opera it carries its own watery images, set as it is in Venice with its canals and boats. For the rest of her life, until her death in 1956, whenever she heard the Bacarolle the Countess would immediately feel the horror of that night, the bone-chilling cold of the North Atlantic, and the terror of seeing the great ship go down. It was that immediate, and that total. And here is the Bacarolle, one of the most popular pieces in opera, innocuous in its beauty, complete in the depth of feeling it could reproduce. ◙

Happy Birthday!

Rumor has it that Hadleyblogger Steve has a milestone birthday today. I'm not sure that we're at liberty to disclose the number, but it is said to be somewhere between 59 and 61. Happy birthday, my friend! Looking forward to having some of your insight back on the blog soon! ◙

Wish I'd Written That

As much as we love the Brewers, unlike Jesus, they didn't die for your sins. With regard to beer and brats on Good Friday, let's just say that's why God created the three-game series." -- Milwaukee archbishop Jerome Listecki, telling Wisconsin Catholics to abide by religious teachings and avoid meat on opening day Friday -- Good Friday, when Catholics are not supposed to eat meat -- at Miller Park. (h/t Peter King at SI.com) What I like - an archbishop with both a sense of humor and a sense of mission. Excellent combination. ◙

Holy Saturday reflection

Traitors who so deeply grieve me, see how much my heart loves you.
To forgive you is my vengance.
You revile me in my shame.
Hear my earnest heartfelt prayer that our God fills you with grace.
This we learn is Christian love.
God, Jehovah, most holy one, You forgive the sinner all sins.
God, Jevovah, gracious one, You bestow the fallen grace and mercy.
Blest are they who follow you.

-- the duet in Der Tod Jesu (Graun, translated, L. Quackenbush, U. Wachsmann-Linnan.) ◙

Holy Week

Yes, you can blame Dr. LaRoche for feeding me a diet of classical sacred works. But when you're being fed the best works from her, you're being fed a cornucopia of the greatest vegetables, fresh from the farm, and nothing processed.

For Holy Week, Carl Heinrich Graun's "Ein Gebeth um neue Stärke" from Der Tod Jesu is found here. (And yes, an English version is being performed at Dr. LaRoche's church.) ◙

Good Friday

Christ of Saint John of the Cross by Salvador Dalí, 1951 ◙

Opera Wednesday - Good Friday Edition

On this Good Friday, here is some of the most famous classical music of the season: the Good Friday scene from Act III of Wagner's Parsifal. Kurt Moll is Gurnemanz, with Sigfried Jersulam as Parsifal and Waltraud Meier as Kundry, in this performance by the Metropolitan Opera conducted by James Levine. ◙