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President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with President of the Council of Ministers of the Italian Republic Giorgia Meloni, who is on a visit to our country.
Welcoming the Italian delegation headed by the Prime Minister to Kyiv, the Head of State called the meeting significant as it takes place on the eve of the anniversary of the full-scale invasion of Russia, the year of our invincibility, joint defense against Russian terror and joint efforts to restore stability and security in Europe.
"Italy and Ukraine share a common vision of the value of peace. Ukrainians and Italians are among those nations that especially cherish life, cherish family, kinship and the opportunity to be with their loved ones. That is why we are striving together to stop the Russian terror as soon as possible, to stop this absolutely unprovoked and aggressive war of Russia against the people of Ukraine," the President said.
This is one of three Lear-60s I pilot for a living, awaiting passengers at San Antonio, Texas. In the background is an Atlas Air Cargo Boeing 747-400 freighter. The LR-60 has a very high power-to-weight ratio giving it the ability to climb from sea-level to 41,000 feet in an average 15 minutes, fully loaded. One night I climbed to 43,000 feet off of Newark, NJ near sea-level, in 13 minutes without realizing it until level-off when I looked at the timer; but the plane was not fully loaded, the outside air temperature remained at or below normal and there were no delays by air traffic control.
Lightly loaded it can sustain a climb of about 7,000 feet per minute for several minutes at an alarming (for the uninitiated) but fun (for the pilots) pitch angle of 25-30 degrees. This is not done with passengers (unless they request it, and once in a great while one will, and so we willingly oblige, starting by holding the brakes until the engines spool up to full thrust, then releasing for the full effect). The usual takeoff and departure is done with great attention to passenger comfort, keeping the acceleration smooth, with only 15 degrees maximum pitch up. Of course, the power must be reduced shortly after getting airborne to avoid exceeding the legal speed limit at low altitude (250 knots below 10,000'), and then back even more when making an initial level-off to satisfy the request of Air Traffic Control. Operating safely and smoothly (comfortably) with passengers is of utmost concern. Without passengers, operating only safely is of utmost concern, but to be smooth, one must stay in practice, and it's a challenge to be smooth, anyways. So we always strive to be so.
It normally cruises between 39,000 and 43,000 feet (with a cabin altitude of about 6,000 with a 9.1 psi differential pressure regardless of the power setting) and is capable of 51,000 feet, but that's really pushing its performance abilities. It almost always goes from the Pacific coast to the Atlantic coast non-stop year-round on a full load of fuel (leaving enough payload for 2 or three passengers (out of 6-9 passenger seats depending on the particular airplane and its seating arrangement) plus the crew of two. In the summer it can often make it nonstop east to west, but during the winter the jetstream, which goes west to east, is stronger and usually keeps our groundspeed too low, forcing a fuel stop in Nebraska or somewhere else in the middle. It takes about 5 hours coast to coast at around 500mph/430kts (maximum range power; "normal cruise" power yields about 475 KTAS, but is less efficient) through the air (true airspeed) +/- the effect of the wind (or, speed of the airmass, in which we are a part of, over the ground). It takes off and lands between about 150 and 160 mph, depending on weight; rather fast due to its lack of wing leading edge devices, as seen on modern airliners--those surfaces that extend forward from the wing allowing it to operate at much slower airspeeds when departing or approaching a runway. It's maximum flying weight is 23,500 pounds, up to 7,800 of that is fuel, with a typical empty weight of 15,000. That's right, a full load of fuel limits the payload to about 700 pounds of passengers and baggage (crew baggage, beverages, catering etc. are included with the empty weight for the purposes of flight planning).
Plan to spend about $3,000 per hour when you charter one of these for a weekend trip from California to visit your daughter at an east coast prep school. Yes, there are many people who think nothing of dropping $30,000 for a two-day round trip [circa 2003]. This particular airplane was new in 2000 and cost about $13,000,000-- currently worth around $7 or 8 million in the market, or so I've been led to believe [circa 2003]. I'm sure glad I didn't buy one new, like my employer did... All I could afford was my Luscombe, about the same as a new car, but without the depreciation. Indeed, a brake job for this thing is nearly what I paid for my airplane, about $12,000 per main gear assembly (there's two, and I think that's just for the parts). Another fun financial factoid: each windshield (L or R) costs no less than $100,000.
Designer: Wei Yingzhou (魏瀛洲)
1986, June
I strive to bring glory to the mother country
Wo wei zuguo zheng guangrong (我为祖国争光荣)
Call nr.: BG E13/85 (Landsberger collection)
The gold medals pictured below are from the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.
From: boundless.uoregon.edu/cgi-bin/showfile.exe?CISOROOT=/arch...(visual%20works)%22
"Portland's Municipal A Self- Guided Tour
The Portland Water Bureau strives to deliver the highest quality drinking water and service to the Portland community while also being conscientious stewards of the city's natural, fiscal and structural resources. For more information about the Portland Water Bureau, visit: www. portlandonline. com/ water • 503- 823- 7770 For information about Portland's public art, please contact the Regional Arts & Culture Council: www. racc. org • 503- 823- 5111 For more information on Portland's municipal fountains, visit: www. portlandonline. com/ water/ fountains Efficiency Most of Portland's decorative fountains recirculate water to minimize water use and run- off. The bureau has installed meters to gauge water use and electrical consumption. Health and Safety The health and safety of Portland's fountains, especially its interactive fountains, is a top priority for the Portland Water Bureau. The bureau cleans fountains regularly, monitors operations and chlorinates the interactive fountains to the level of a swimming pool.
P o r t l and' s M u n i c i pa l F o u n ta i n s
The Portland Water Bureau has proudly maintained Portland's municipal decorative fountains since 1988. The Water Bureau maintains beautiful fountains throughout the Portland area and the largest concentration of them lies within the downtown area. Take this opportunity to discover and explore downtown Portland and her treasure chest of unique artwork — Portland's fountains. Unlock their secrets and ponder their history as you wind your way through this bustling area of the city on a 2.6- mile, self- guided tour. Maintenance Maintaining these fountains is no small feat.
The Portland Water Bureau employs one full- time "Fountain Man" who spends his days ensuring that Portland's fountains are in working order, safe for public enjoyment and running efficiently. The bureau turns the fountains off for the cold weather months to prevent water from blowing or freezing on surfaces. This "down time" also provides an opportunity for maintenance and repair projects.
Portland's Interactive Fountains:
• Salmon Street Springs Fountain
Gov. Tom McCall Waterfront Park
• McCoy Fountain
N. Trenton Street & Newman Avenue
• Holladay Park Fountain
NE 11th Avenue & Multnomah Street
• Jamison Square Fountain
810 NW 11th Avenue
Fountain enthusiasts should be aware that the water in these fountains is not suitable for drinking. Also, please use caution when walking near pools of water or on slippery surfaces. Aesthetics The Portland Water Bureau works with the Regional Arts & Culture Council to maintain aesthetics at each fountain. Sculptures undergo restoration when needed, in order to present the art as originally intended. For more information on Portland's municipal fountains visit www. portlandonline. com/ water/ fountains
Other fountains maintained by the Portland Water Bureau:
• A Fountain for a Rose (O' Bryant Square Fountain) SW Park Avenue & Washington Street
• Holladay Park Fountain NE 11th Avenue & Multnomah Street
• The Rose Petal SE 106th Avenue & Stark Street
• McCoy Fountain N. Trenton Street & Newman Avenue
The City of Portland will make reasonable accommodation for people with disabilities. Please notify us no less than five ( 5) business days prior to the event by phone at 503- 823- 7404, by the city's TTY at 503- 823- 6868, or by the Oregon Relay Service at 1- 800- 735- 2900. Printed on recycled paper 03/ 2009 Portland Water Bureau 1120 SW 5th Avenue, Room 600 Portland, OR 97204- 1926 Phone: 503- 823- 7404 Customer Service: 503- 823- 7770 Web site: portlandonline. com/ water Randy Leonard, Commissioner David G. Shaff, Administrator Fountains Ira Keller Forecourt Fountain Dreamer Fountain Salmon Street Springs Fountain Shemanski Fountain or " Rebecca at the Well" Lovejoy Fountain Animals in Pools Fountains Jamison Square Fountain The Jamison Square Fountain is the centerpiece of Northwest Portland's Jamison Square. Named in honor of William Jamison, an early advocate and catalyst for the development of the Pearl District, the fountain's wading pool offers cooling relief on hot summer days. Water cascades from stone joints into shallow pools where it ebbs and flows like the tide. Washington Stark Oak Pine Alder Morrison Yamhill Taylor Salmon Main Madison Jefferson Columbia Mill Harrison College Hall 9th Park Broadway 6th 5th 4th 3rd 2nd 1st SW Naito Parkway Ash Clay 10th 11th Montgomery Market Jackson Ankeny Lincoln 12th Burnside Walk up the stairs to reach Burnside Burnside Bridge Morrison Bridge Hawthorne Bridge Gov. Tom McCall Waterfront Park Willamette River 8 7 6 5 4 Streetcar or MAX stop Walking Tour Streetcar or MAX Line 12 10 1 2 2 3 11 9 LOOK BUT DON'T DRINK The water in the decorative fountains is not for drinking. Please use designated crosswalks when possible. Total Tour Length: 2.6 miles Total Tour Time: 2 hours Por t l and Fou n ta i n s Wa l k i n g To u r 1. Pioneer Courthouse Square Fountain SW Broadway Avenue & Yamhill Street 1983 • Will Martin In 1849, Elijah Hill bought this block of downtown Portland for $ 24 and a pair of boots. The site of Portland's first schoolhouse, Pioneer Courthouse Square is now the most visited attraction in Portland. The fountain, which features imported tile, is a major part of Portland's " living room." Look for designer Will Martin's bronze hat at the top of the fountain. 2. Animals in Pools Fountains SW Yamhill & Morrison streets between 5th & 6th avenues 1986 • Georgia Gerber • bronze, concrete Eleven " pools" feature sculptures of animals native to Oregon. Sea lions, beavers, bears, river otters, ducks and deer line Morrison and Yamhill streets. Sculptor Georgia Gerber wanted to offer " a sense of the wild in the midst of a busy city." In 1991, one of the beloved bear cubs was stolen, but public outcry led to an anonymous tip that the cub was hiding in the bushes in neighboring Washington County. 3. Shemanski Fountain ( Rebecca at the Well) Park Blocks between SW Salmon & Main streets 1926 • Oliver Barrett ( stone) and Carl Linde ( bronze) Joseph Shemanski, the fountain's namesake, was a Polish immigrant who began his career selling clocks on an installment plan; he eventually owned 34 Pacific Coast stores of the Eastern Outfitting Company. Shemanski commissioned this fountain as a gesture of appreciation for the people of Portland who had so warmly welcomed him. His compassion for animals inspired the three pet- level drinking fountains. There are also three human- level fountains. Two years after the initial fountain was erected, Shemanski commissioned the sculpture of Rebecca at the Well, which reflects the biblical tale of Abraham's discovery of a bride for Isaac when he saw Rebecca drawing water for camels. Abraham chose Rebecca for Issac because of her kindness and service. 4. Chimney Fountain North of SW Lincoln Street between 3rd & 4th avenues 1968 • brick The southernmost of downtown fountains, this small structure was erected as part of the South Auditorium Project, the Portland Development Commission's first urban renewal project. The Chimney Fountain gives the illusion that water is flowing between the bricks, as smoke might seep through a chimney. 5. Lovejoy Fountain SW 3rd Avenue, between Lincoln & Harrison streets 1968 • Lawrence Halprin • concrete, brick In an 1843 contest with Francis Pettygrove, Asa Lovejoy, this fountain's namesake, lost two out of three coin tosses and thus the right to name our city after his hometown of Boston. Lovejoy and Pettygrove flipped the coin a second time to determine which of two neighboring parks would be named Lovejoy and which would be named Pettygrove. This beautiful fountain was built in Lovejoy's park and took on his name. With conservation in mind, the Portland Water Bureau fitted the Lovejoy Fountain with a more efficient water pump in 2008. Before installation of the new pump, the fountain took 12 hours to fill. 6. Dreamer Fountain SW 3rd Avenue between Market & Harrison streets 1979 Manuel Izquierdo • Muntz bronze Located in Pettygrove Park, Manuel Izquierdo's design of a reclining woman is made from surplus navy bronze that he bought and cleaned. Izquierdo said, " The Dreamer speaks of hope, of beauty and serenity, of love, and for a better life in our midst." Izquierdo filled the sculpture with foam so that falling rain would make a gentle sound like a kettledrum instead of ringing hollow. Izquierdo is professor emeritus at the Pacific Northwest College of Art. 7. Ira Keller Forecourt Fountain SW 3rd & 4th avenues between Market & Clay streets 1971 • Angela Danadjieva Designed to mimic the majestic waterfalls of Oregon's Cascade Mountains, the Ira Keller Fountain is truly one of Portland's best known landmarks. Formerly named, simply, Forecourt Fountain, it was renamed in 1978 in honor of the first chairman of the Portland Development Commission, Ira Keller, who had a major influence on the rehabilitation of the area. Residents and visitors alike flock to this series of waterfalls and pools which occupy nearly a full acre in downtown Portland's busiest business district. New York Times critic Ada Louise Huxtable declared this " one of the most important urban spaces since the Renaissance." 8. Elk Fountain SW Main between 3rd & 4th avenues 1900 • Roland Perry ( bronze) and H. G. Wright ( stone) Inspired by the Skidmore Fountain, former mayor David Thompson, president of the Oregon Humane Society, donated the money for this fountain as a trough for horses and dogs, and as a reminder of the elk that once lived in the West Hills and used the neighborhood as a feeding ground. Shortly after the statue was erected, a local artist offered to wire the antlers with electric light bulbs for $ 30. The offer was declined. 9. Salmon Street Springs Fountain SW Salmon Street at Gov. Tom McCall Waterfront Park 1978 • Robert Perron • concrete The Salmon Street Springs Fountain is one of Portland's most iconic fountains, majestically spouting water in an array of designs and speeds. A computer changes the pattern of the water display every 20 minutes. At full capacity the fountain recycles 4,924 gallons of water per minute through as many as 137 jets at one time. Taking its name from the winner of a city- wide naming contest, the fountain has become one of Portland's most popular summer hangouts. A large gathering at this fountain's 20- Year Anniversary Celebration in spring 2008, proved that Salmon Street Springs is more popular than ever. Citizens turned out en masse to celebrate its presence, despite rainy conditions and cool temperatures. 10. Skidmore Fountain SW 1st Avenue between W. Burnside & Ankeny streets 1888 • Olin Warner • bronze, granite This fountain, Portland's oldest commissioned public art, stands at what was once the city center. Druggist Stephen Skidmore left $ 5,000 in his will so that " horses, men, and dogs" could have a cold drink. The fountain was sculpted by Olin Warner who modeled the face of his wife on one of the two caryatids. New York critics lamented that the sculpture was in Portland and that it looked down " upon buggies and buck- boards, and shirt- sleeves and slouch hats in Oregon instead of decorating the Central Park." Skidmore Fountain is inscribed with the quote, " Good citizens are the riches of a city" a line from the dedicatory speech by C. E. S. Wood, an attorney and member of the Fountain Committee. For the dedication, brewer Henry Weinhard offered to pipe beer through the fountain, but the chairman of the Fountain Committee declined. For nearly two decades, people drank water from tin cups that hung from the lion's heads on the fountain. 12. Lee Kelly's Fountain SW 6th Avenue & Pine Street 1977 • Lee Kelly • stainless steel Oregon artist Lee Kelly won an international competition to design this sculpture. Kelly has designed several other sculptures in Portland and throughout the Pacific Northwest. In this work, water flows over several 20- foot- tall steel structures. In conjunction with the Regional Arts & Culture Council, the Water Bureau helped to restore Kelly's fountain in 2004. The fountain had become run- down over the years. Opt i o n a l Tour E x t e n s i o n : 13. Jamison Square Fountain 810 NW 11th Avenue ( Jamison Square) • 2002 If you're feeling extra energetic, head over to Jamison Square Fountain. Just across West Burnside and into the Pearl District, Jamison has quickly become one of the city's most popular hot- weather hot spots. Poised as the centerpiece of Jamison Square, the fountain's wading pool offers cool relief to kids, dogs and adults all summer long. It was named in honor of William Jamison, an early advocate of Pearl District development. Somewhat like Oregon's coast, water cascades into shallow pools where it ebbs and flows like the tide. 11. Car Wash Fountain SW 5th Avenue & Ankeny Street 1977 • Carter, Hull, Nishita, McCulley & Baxter • steel This uniquely shaped fountain never washed cars, but the name seems appropriate given its similarity to a car wash. As a precaution for passing pedestrians, a wind gauge shuts off the pumps if the wind speed exceeds 2 miles per hour. For more information on Portland's municipal fountains visit: www. portlandonline. com/ water/ fountains"
Row houses located on the 1700 block of U Street NW in Washington, D.C. Built in 1902 by Charles W. King, Sr., following the designs of architect Nicholas T. Haller, the Romanesque Revival style homes are designated as contributing properties to the Strivers' Section Historic District, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.
This is one of my older photos I originally uploaded to Wikimedia Commons.
Goethe's Secret Revelation PART TWO THE RIDDLE IN FAUST Esoteric Two Addresses given 11nth and 12th March, 1909, at Berlin . It was in August, 1831, that Goethe sealed up a packet and handed it to his faithful secretary Eckermann and prepared his testamentary directions for the editing of this sealed-up treasure. This packet contained in a comprehensive way the whole striving of Goethe's life. It contained the second part of Goethe's Faust; which was not to be published until after Goethe's death. Goethe was aware that in this work he had given the contents of his rich, many-sided, far-reaching and deeply-penetrating life to human existence, and the importance of this moment for him may be gathered from the words he uttered at the time, ‘I am now finished my life's true work, anything I do further and whether I do it or not, is all the same!’ If we permit a fact such as this to work on the soul we can say: It would not be easy for a human life to become fruitful for the rest of humanity in a more beautiful, harmonious way, or indeed to become fruitful in a more conscious manner. There is something deeply affecting in the thought of Goethe's life at this point of time — for he lived barely one year longer — in that he should have visited Ilmenau once more and there re-read the beautiful verse he had written on the 7th of September, 1783, when he was still a comparatively young man.‘Above all heights Is rest, In the tree tops Thou feelest Scarce a breath,The birds are silent in the woods, Only wait, soon Thou too shalt rest.’One may well ask whether these lines may not have signified at that time a frame of mind regulating Goethe's ideas in a new way as he re-read them in the evening of his life with affecting tears.Goethe's Faust is truly a testament of the very first order when considered with reference to its literary and intellectual standpoint.In 1831 Goethe finished the work which had occupied him from his earliest youth, having worked energetically from the year 1824 at the second part of Faust. We find that Goethe knew from the beginning of 1770 that he had what may be called the Faust disposition and that he began in 1774 to write down the first part of Faust, returning again and again to this poem in the most important moments of his life.Notably he took the first part of Faust with him when he went to Weimar and owing to his position there entered the great world. Certainly it was not produced there. But because one of the Weimar Court ladies, Fräulein von Göchhausen, preserved a copy of the Faust which Goethe took with him to Weimar, we to-day possess the form in which it was when he took it there. We therefore know the form in which Faust was printed for the first time and published in 1790, and further we know the setting in which the whole of Goethe's works appeared in 1808 in the first edition. All that we have of Faust, including that very important document which Goethe left as his testament, shows us the different stages of Goethe's growth. It is endlessly interesting to observe how these four stages of Goethe's Faust-creation appear to us in different ways, according to its inner nature, and how they represent a crescendo in the whole of Goethe's life-endeavour. What Goethe took with him to Weimar is a literary work of a quite personal character into which he had poured the feelings, the degrees of knowledge and also the despair of knowledge, as they went with him through the Frankfort time into the Strassburg time and also into the first Weimar period. It is the work of a man hotly striving after knowledge, striving to feel himself into life, experiencing every despair that an upright honourable man can go through, and all this he had poured into this work. All this is in the first part of Faust. But when Faust appeared in 1790 as a fragment, it was recognized that Goethe had worked at it and transformed it out of a longing lying deep in his soul and inner life which had become enlightened through his contemplation of Italian nature and of Italian works of Art. Out of this personal work of one who had been tossed to and fro in life's storms there emerged the work of one, who to a certain degree, had become unshackled and who had a very clear view of life before his soul.Then came the time of Goethe's friendship with Schiller. The time when in his inner being he learned to know and experience a world which had long become rooted within him. A world of which one can say that he who experiences it has had his spiritual eyes opened, so that he can see into the surrounding spiritual world. And now Faust's personality becomes a being placed between two worlds, between the spiritual world to which man can raise himself through purification, through the ennobling of himself and that world which drags him down. Faust becomes a being placed between the world of good and the world of evil. And while previously we saw in Faust the life of the single striving personality, now we see before us a great conflict carried on between the good and evil powers around man. Man is thus placed in the centre as the worthiest object for which the good and evil beings fight in the world. Though in the very beginning Faust is seen as a man doubting all knowledge, he now comes before us as one placed between heaven and hell. Thus the poem reaches an essentially higher stage and a higher existence.In the form in which Faust appears in 1808 it seems as if thousands of years of human development resound. We are reminded of the great dramatic representation of man's life produced in ancient times in the Book of Job, where the evil spirit went among men and stood up before God, and God said to him: ‘Thou hast been to and fro on the earth, hast thou considered my servant Job?’ What is here said we find in the poem, ‘The Prologue in Heaven’ where God speaks with Mephistopheles, the messenger of the evil spirituality: ‘The self in them expands to a spiritual universe.’ At that time at Frankfort he had the feeling, ‘Away from the mere striving after ideas! Away from the merely perceptive sense observation! There must be a path to the sources of existence!’ and he came into touch with what one can call alchemistic, mystical and theosophical literature. He himself attempted the practice of alchemy. He relates how he came to know of a work through which many sought for similar knowledge at that time, Welling's ‘Opus Mago-Cabalisticum et Theosophicum.’ This book was much thought of then as giving a knowledge of the sources of existence. Goethe studied by degrees Paracelsus, Valentinus and above all a work which from its whole method must have produced a deep impression on all those who strove after such knowledge, ‘Aurea Catena Homeri.’ This was a representation of nature the Mystics in the Middle Ages believed to see. The study of these mystical, alchemistic, theosophical books must have had a similar effect on Goethe to that which a man striving to-day after the same things would experience if he took up the books of Eliphas Levy or any other thinker on the same lines. Indeed at that time these things must have had an even more bewildering effect upon Goethe because these different writers no longer really understood the magic, theosophy, etc., of which they wrote. It was impossible to speak in direct way of the real grandeur and meaning of these things, proceeding from an ancient wisdom which had lived in human souls, for the meaning was hidden under an outer garb which included all kinds of physical and chemical forms. For those who merely saw what appeared outwardly in these books it was the greatest nonsense, and at that time it was most difficult to penetrate behind these secrets and arrive at the real meaning. But we must not forget that Goethe from his deep striving for knowledge had developed an intuitive mind. He must have been greatly pleased when on opening the ‘Aurea Catena Homeri’ he saw on the first page a symbol which had a deep effect on his soul; two triangles interlaced; in the corners the signs of the planets, drawn in a wonderful way, a flying dragon wound round in a circle, beneath which another dragon had fixed stiffening itself, and when he read the words on the first page, saying that the flying dragon symbolizes the stream which sends those forces which stream down from out of the Cosmos to the stiffened dragon, showing how heaven and earth hang together, or as it is expressed there: ‘How the spiritual forces of heaven pour into the earth's centre.’These mysterious signs and words must have made a great impression upon Goethe. For instance, those which depict the whole growth of the earth: ‘From chaos to that which is called the universal quintessence’ — a remarkable sentence, curiously mixed up with signs of a chaotic nature, still undifferentiated right through the mineral, plant and animal kingdoms, right up to man and to that perspective to which man is developing in ever greater refinement. But it was not easy to find a way of penetrating to the deeper meaning. So Goethe left Frankfort in a frame of mind which can be described in the following words: I have found nothing. These seekers into nature can only give me dry, empty ideas; anything that can be squeezed out of them is but life's water. I have busied myself with much that has come down to us from the past from those who declare that they saw into the secrets of life. But the way, the way drives one to despair!This was sometimes the mood in Goethe's soul. He was not to be bewitched by easy speculations or philosophizing, or by confused symbols and explanations from those old books, which worked so wonderfully and forebodingly on him. They looked at him with their mysteries as something to which he could find no way. But anyone who knew Goethe's soul, knew the seed was already sown in his soul which was to germinate later. But he felt himself as one who was rejected and unworthy to unravel the secrets of life. Then he went to Strassburg.There he met people who must have interested him in one way or the other. He got to know Jung-Stilling with his deeply mystical soul, who owing to the development of peculiar forces generally found sleeping in men, had looked deeply into the hidden side of existence. He met Herder at Strassburg, who had gone through similar moods and who in times of desperation had often been at the point of a denial of future life. In Herder he learnt to know a man who suffered from a surfeit of life and who said, I have studied much, discerning sundry things connected with men's works and men's strivings on the earth. But he was unable to say to himself, I have had one moment when my longing after the sources of life has been satisfied. This was when he was ill and inclined to deny everything with bitter irony. Yet it was Herder who pointed out many depths in the riddles of life, and Goethe found in him a truly human Faust. But that side of negation which is not the outcome of mockery and scorn Goethe learnt to know later through his friend Merck. Goethe's mother who disliked criticism of people and all moralizing said of Merck, he can never leave Mephistopheles at home, in him we are quite used to it. In Merck Goethe found a disclaimer of much that is worth striving for in life. Over against all these impressions which Goethe received from the Strassburg people, it was through Nature and his observation of Nature that many of life's puzzles were cleared up for him.At the same time we must think of Goethe as a man possessed of a sharp, penetrating mind; he was not an unpractical man. He was an advocate, but only practised for a short time. Those who knew Goethe's work as an advocate and later as a Minister, were acquainted with his eminently practical mind. As advocate he knew little more than what he had learnt by heart from law books. But he was a man able to decide very quickly on any point laid before him; such a man can also map out clearly life's course.Let us consider Goethe when during his Italian journey, he gradually arrived at the discovery of the primeval plant, he collected stones, prepared himself diligently to take up the work of research, and did not seek to know immediately ‘how one thing strives to enter another’ but said to himself: ‘If you would gain a premonition’ of ‘how one thing works and lives in another’ as heavenly powers rise and fall, offering each the ‘golden urn,’ examine the vertebras of the spinal column and the way in which one bone is connected with the next; and how one faculty helps another. Seek in the smallest thing the picture of the greatest.Goethe became a very diligent student during his travels in Italy, examining everything. He formed the opinion that if an artist acted ‘according to the laws which are followed by nature herself’ and understood by the Greeks, the divine will be present in his works even as it is in the works of creation. For Goethe, art is a ‘manifestation of the secret laws of nature.’ The creations of the artists are works of nature on a higher stage of perfection. Art is man's continuation and conclusion of nature. ‘For since man is the head of nature so he regards himself as a complete nature, but also as one which can call forth a further rise. He strives for this through the acquisition of all accomplishments and virtues which call for choice, order, harmony, and meaning, and at last rises to the production of the work of art.’
We can say that during the Italian journey everything that came before Goethe took on definite forms and through inner soul experiences appeared clearly before him. So once again he took up ‘Faust,’ and we perceive how he endeavoured to bring the separate parts into union. But we also perceive how he interested himself in an objective manner in what Faust could become for the people of the North. In Italy he became particularly conscious of the great difference between people who had been brought up amid classical surroundings and those who had not. He found it strange that so little should be heard in Rome of ghost stories such as were common in the North. In the Villa Borghese he wrote at this time the ‘Witches Kitchen’ scene, as one who had lost touch with all such things, but also as one who recalled to memory the spirit of the earth. When he had previously written about the earth spirit, he represented it in such a way that Faust turned away from it, as from a ‘hideous worm.’ But the fact of turning away from it, even without understanding why, remains in the soul and works on further, as it did in Goethe. But those who become impatient and refuse to wait until after long years the seed grows, are unable to see the way clearly. And when in Italy Goethe knew that a turning away from the terrible countenance would have its effect upon his soul, and now these words arise:‘Sublime Spirit, thou gavest me, gavest me all For which I begged. It was not without reason That thou didst turn thy face in fire to me And for a kingdom gavest me the glorious nature With strength to feel it and to enjoy it. Not A coldly astonished gaze didst thou grant to me But didst permit me to look into her profound bosom As into that of a friend. Past me didst thou lead the ranks of the living And didst teach me to know, in the quiet bushes, In air, and in water, my brother. And when the storm roared and rattled in the woods And there fell the neighbouring branches of the giant fir Squashing the undergrowth and in their fall Sounding like thunder in the hollow of the hills, Thou didst lead me to a safe Grotto, where Thou didst show me myself and opened my heart To deep and secret wonders.’Before Goethe, there stands the possibility of the human soul, through its own development expanding to a spiritual universe. Through a patient sacrificial resigned search, the fruits stand before his soul which as germs were planted when he came into touch with the earth spirit. We can see through this monologue in ‘Wald und Höhle’ (wood and grotto) what a forward jerk this was towards the ripening of the fruits in his soul, for it shows us that the seed already sown was not sown in vain. And as a warning to have patience, to wait until such seeds had ripened in his soul, that fragment of ‘Faust’ meets us which appeared with this setting in 1790. And now we see how Goethe finds the way step by step after being led to his ‘safe grotto where the secret deep wonders of his own heart were opened to him,’ he obtains that comprehensive survey which bids him no longer abide with his own sorrow, but teaches him to rise above his sorrow, to send his foreseeing spirit out into the Macrocosmos, watch the fighting of the good and evil spirits and see men on their battle ground. And in ‘Faust’ in 1808 he sent out beforehand the ‘Prologue in Heaven:’Raphael: ‘The sun-orb sings, in emulation, 'Mid brother-spheres, his ancient round: His path predestined through Creation He ends with step of thunder-sound.’We next see how the macrocosmic Mights oppose the forces of the great world. We see too from out the experiences of Goethe's soul, what a remarkable light falls on the two dragons with which at one time in his youth he came in touch.‘Faust’ is such a universal poem because it contains so many warnings. It also gives us that golden saying: ‘Wait in confidence for the development of thy inner forces, even if that means waiting a very long time!’ These words also sound as a warning which stand as an attribute before Faust, when Goethe looks back to those ‘fluctuating figures which in early days had once shown a troubled countenance’ but which now are flooded with light. Now he had waited so long that the friends who had taken such a vivid interest in Faust as he had appeared to them in the first form, had died, and those who had not died were very far away. Goethe had been obliged to wait for the development of the seed already sown in him.Now these striking words meet us:‘My sorrow speaks to an unknown crowd, Their applause e'en makes my heart feel heavy, And those who once delighted in my song If they still live, in other lands are scattered.’No longer did it matter to those who in youth had felt with him. He had had to wait, as the last lines of this dedication so beautifully express it — ‘What was once a reality to me, has gone into the unreal: but what has remained for me and appears to outer vision as unreal, that to me is now true, and it is only now that I can give it as truth.’ So we see how this poem, even if only looked at in such an external manner as we have to-day, leads us into the depths of the human soul.‘Faust’ was begun in a desultory manner, some parts being pushed in between others, and therefore Goethe was unable to show in a continuous way what he had experienced in his soul. But something else led to the fact that Goethe expressed his deepest experiences in ‘Faust.’The ‘Helena scene’ also belongs to the first part of ‘Faust’ written by Goethe. But we find it was not included even in the ‘Faust’ of 1808. Why not? Because the manner in which Goethe had finished ‘Faust’ at that time would not allow it. What Goethe wished to say through the Helena scene was the expression of such a deep premonition of the deepest riddle of existence, that the first part was not sufficiently prepared to allow of this. Only when Goethe had reached an advanced age, was he able to give a true form to what really was the inner work of his life.We see how his mind had expanded so that he was able to grasp the worlds of the macrocosm, as expressed in the ‘Prologue in Heaven.’ We shall also see the way in which Goethe represents the stages of the soul's experience, leading men from the first stage up to that of imaginative vision, where the soul penetrating ever deeper and deeper, bursts at last the doors of the spiritual world, which Mephistopheles would close. Goethe also represents these inner experiences. For he places in the second part of ‘Faust’ the experiences of a soul through secret scientific study, and we see here one of the deepest riddles of existence, which if recognized, would be found to be an announcement of Western spiritual science given in imposing language. One is tempted to place such a poem as the ‘Bhagavad Gita’ and the second part of ‘Faust’ side by side. For great and powerful wisdom speaks out of such Eastern writings. It seems as if the gods themselves desired in them to speak with men to express the wisdom out of which the world was formed. Indeed it is so.Now let us look at the second part of ‘Faust.’ Here we see a striving human soul which has raised itself to spiritual vision from outer physical perception; we see how it has worked its way up to true clairvoyance when Faust enters the spiritual world and finds the spiritual choir around him ...‘Hearken! Hark! — The Hours careering Sounding loud to spirit-hearing. See the new-born day appearing! Rocky portals jarring shatter, Phœbus' wheels in rolling clatter, With a crash the Light draws near! Pealing rays and trumpet-blazes — Eye is blinded, ear amazes: The Unheard can no one hear!’Faust II, Act I.to that passage where Faust is outwardly dazzled, so that the outer world is lost to his perception and he says to himself: ‘Only within shines clear light! ...’ up to that passage in which the soul works itself up to the spheres of world existence, where the spiritual worlds are to be seen in all their purity, and the riddle of the world discloses itself to the soul. This is a way which we must designate as an esoteric one.The way in which we can penetrate from the outer to the inner life of Goethe's world enigma, we shall see to-morrow, and we shall also see from out of what depths Goethe spoke the word which at last gave him the certainty he needed with reference to all the longings, all the sorrows, pains and strivings for knowledge in his life.‘Whoever zealously strives We can redeem him; And if love from above Feels an interest in him, The blest choir will be there With a friendly greeting.’We shall consider to-morrow how Goethe solved this riddle of existence, and how that which lives in the soul can rise up to its true home. It will give us the answer to what Goethe placed as the riddle of his existence and about which he gives us such a hopeful answer at the end of the second part of ‘Faust:’‘For the spiritual world, That noble member, Is saved from evil. Whoever strives zealously We can redeem him! ...’This tells us Faust can be saved and those spirits will not conquer who by bringing men into the material bring them also to destruction.
Part of Michael Rawling’s Elemental Series striving to represent the landscape more completely than historical, Pastoral art: Liquid, organic and mineral samples are collected at the site of the picture - from the very place depicted within the photograph - and bonded with the film. The resulting image is created both by the hand of the artist exposing light on to the film and also by the physical elements of the landscape - the resulting image created more deeply representative of the landscape itself.
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Arbon, Lake Constance, Switzerland.
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Found Materials
Lake water, reeds, algae.
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All Rights Reserved.
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See more at: photography.michaelrawling.com
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You can buy a prints at: etsy.me/2NnhRCB
Mingle Media TV and Red Carpet Report host Brogyn Gage were invited to cover GBK’s annual Gift Lounge in honor of the 2014 MTV Movie Awards at The SLS Hotel, a luxury hotel in Beverly Hills.
Get the Story from the Red Carpet Report Team, follow us on Twitter and Facebook at:
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The 2014 MTV Movie Awards Nominees and Presenters received goods and services from the GBK sponsors ranging from fashion and beauty products, to exotic travel destinations and the latest gourmet treats.
2014 MTV Movie Award Nominees Gift Bag Included...
...goods and services ranging from fashion and beauty products, to exotic travel destinations and the latest gourmet treats from Barry’s Gourmet Brownies, KOR Water, Jackson’s Honest Potato Chips, Deep Eddy Vodka, Ripped Cream, a natural protein coffee creamer, Sabra hummus dips and a reusable cooler bag full of single serve Sabra products and chips.
GBK’s lounge will feature must have luxurious products such as Keratin Complex’s Style Therapy line of keratin-infused styling products and styling tools; Fracassi Lashes' lashes, lash extensions, and waxing and Very Pretty Skin's various cosmetic gifts. At the lounge guests found fashion and accessories from Qupid for fashionable shoes for women, a gift suite favorite The Artisan Group® who brings the latest in trendy jewelry, spa and bath products, fine art photography, and other handcrafted gifts like the newly designed Surfrider watch from Pono Woodworks, Gummyz’ new silicon, mutli-shape bracelet and THURSDAY FRIDAY’s chic carryalls which are the go to canvas tote. Other unique gifts included Sandra Espinet's stylish coffee table book, electronic gifts from Onkoyo USA, VIP memberships from MillionaireMatch.com, Audiopark's Audiowrap – the first wearable designer headphone, BLOW e-Hookah's portable mini hookah and RufusWiena.com, Rufus Wiena is a world class magician who performs worldwide.
A true highlight of the lounge was from Millennium International Travel gifting nominees a gift certificate for 6 days and 5 nights at the Mayan Palace Resort.
Giving Good
GBK is best known for their passion of giving back and at the 2014 MTV Movie Awards gift suite they featured the following organizations:
Lambda Legal - For more than 40 years, Lambda Legal has led the fight for equal and fair treatment of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and those with HIV through impact litigation, education and public policy work.http://www.lambdalegal.com
Los Angeles Youth Network - The Los Angeles Youth Network’s mission is to empower abused, neglected and homeless adolescents to become self-sufficient. We do this by providing street outreach, food, emergency shelter, a transitional living program, and educational enrichment programs in a safe and nurturing environment.http://www.layn.org
Autism Speaks – Our goal is to change the future for all who struggle with autism spectrum disorders. We are dedicated to funding global biomedical research into the causes, prevention, treatments and a possible cure for autism. We strive to raise public awareness about autism and its effects on individuals, families, and a society: and we work to bring hope to all who deal with the hardships of this disorder. We are committed to raising funds necessary to support these goals. www.Autismspeaks.org
All guests were treated to snacks at the GBK Movie Awards Lounge from:
Monster Energy Drink; Guayaki Organic Yerba Mate; POPwater; Vita Coco; Open Road Snacks; GimMe; COMBOS® Baked Snacks; MARATHON Bar®; and Pasta Chips.
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About GBK
GBK, is a recipient of multiple BizBash Awards for “Best Gift Bag,” and is a luxury lifestyle gifting and special events company, specializing in entertainment marketing integration. Formed in 2000 by Gavin Keilly, the company’s Founder and CEO, GBK consists of five divisions: GBK Celebrity Gifting, GBK Special Events, GBK Weddings, GBK Charitable Consulting and GBK Marketing/Public Relations. Widely known in the entertainment industry for bringing that little extra something into the Gifting Lounge environment, GBK offers its clients a full range of marketing services. For more information on Gavin B. Keilly (CEO), Carla Domen (VP) or GBK, please go to gbkproductions.com.
Steely Dan is an American rock duo founded in 1972 by core members Walter Becker (guitars, bass, backing vocals) and Donald Fagen (keyboards, lead vocals). Blending rock, jazz, latin music, reggae, traditional pop, R&B, blues,[2] and sophisticated studio production with cryptic and ironic lyrics, the band enjoyed critical and commercial success starting from the early 1970s until breaking up in 1981.[2] Throughout their career, the duo recorded with a revolving cast of session musicians, and in 1974 retired from live performances to become a studio-only band. Rolling Stone has called them "the perfect musical antiheroes for the Seventies".[4]
After the group disbanded in 1981, Becker and Fagen were less active throughout most of the next decade, though a cult following[2] remained devoted to the group. Since reuniting in 1993, Steely Dan has toured steadily and released two albums of new material, the first of which, Two Against Nature, earned a Grammy Award for Album of the Year. They have sold more than 40 million albums worldwide and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in March 2001.[5][6][7][8] VH1 ranked Steely Dan at #82 on their list of the 100 greatest musical artists of all time.[9] Founding member Walter Becker died on September 3, 2017, leaving Fagen as the sole official member.
Contents
1History
1.1Formative and early years (1967–1972)
1.2Can't Buy a Thrill and Countdown to Ecstasy (1972–1973)
1.3Pretzel Logic and Katy Lied (1974–1976)
1.4The Royal Scam and Aja (1976–1978)
1.5Gaucho and breakup (1978–1981)
1.6Time off (1981–1993)
1.7Reunion, Alive in America (1993–2000)
1.8Two Against Nature and Everything Must Go (2000–2003)
1.8.1Firing of Roger Nichols
1.9Touring, solo activity (2003–2017)
1.10After Becker's death (2017–present)
2Musical and lyrical style
2.1Music
2.1.1Overall sound
2.1.2Backing vocals
2.1.3Horns
2.1.4Composition and chord use
2.2Lyrics
3Members
3.1Timeline
4Discography
5See also
6References
7External links
History
Formative and early years (1967–1972)
Becker and Fagen met in 1967 at Bard College, in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. As Fagen passed by a café, The Red Balloon, he heard Becker practicing the electric guitar.[10] In an interview, Fagen recounted the experience: "I hear this guy practicing, and it sounded very professional and contemporary. It sounded like, you know, like a black person, really."[10] He introduced himself to Becker and asked, "Do you want to be in a band?"[10] Discovering that they enjoyed similar music, the two began writing songs together.
Becker and Fagen began playing in local groups. One such group, known as the Don Fagen Jazz Trio, the Bad Rock Group and later the Leather Canary, included future comedy star Chevy Chase on drums. They played covers of songs by The Rolling Stones ("Dandelion"), Moby Grape ("Hey Grandma"), and Willie Dixon ("Spoonful"), as well as some original compositions.[10] Terence Boylan, another Bard musician, remembered that Fagen took readily to the beatnik life while attending college: "They never came out of their room, they stayed up all night. They looked like ghosts—black turtlenecks and skin so white that it looked like yogurt. Absolutely no activity, chain-smoking Lucky Strikes and dope."[10] Fagen himself would later remember it as "probably the only time in my life that I actually had friends."[11]
After Fagen graduated in 1969, the two moved to Brooklyn and tried to peddle their tunes in the Brill Building in midtown Manhattan. Kenny Vance (of Jay and the Americans), who had a production office in the building, took an interest in their music, which led to work on the soundtrack of the low-budget Richard Pryor film You've Got to Walk It Like You Talk It or You'll Lose That Beat. Becker later said bluntly, "We did it for the money."[12] A series of demos from 1968 to 1971 are available in multiple different releases, not authorized by Becker and Fagen.[13] This collection features approximately 25 tracks and is notable for its sparse arrangements (Fagen plays solo piano on many songs) and lo-fi production, a contrast with Steely Dan's later work. Although some of these songs ("Caves of Altamira", "Brooklyn", "Barrytown") were re-recorded for Steely Dan albums, most were never officially released.
Becker and Fagen joined the touring band of Jay and the Americans for about a year and a half.[14] They were at first paid $100 per show, but partway through their tenure the band's tour manager cut their salaries in half.[14] The group's lead singer, Jay Black, dubbed Becker and Fagen "the Manson and Starkweather of rock 'n' roll", referring to cult leader Charles Manson and spree killer Charles Starkweather.[14]
They had little success after moving to Brooklyn, although Barbra Streisand recorded their song "I Mean To Shine" on her 1971 Barbra Joan Streisand album. Their fortunes changed when one of Vance's associates, Gary Katz, moved to Los Angeles to become a staff producer for ABC Records. He hired Becker and Fagen as staff songwriters; they flew to California. Katz would produce all their 1970s albums in collaboration with engineer Roger Nichols. Nichols would win six Grammy Awards for his work with the band from the 1970s to 2001.[15]
After realizing that their songs were too complex for other ABC artists, at Katz's suggestion Becker and Fagen formed their own band with guitarists Denny Dias and Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, drummer Jim Hodder and singer David Palmer, and Katz signed them to ABC as recording artists. Fans of Beat Generation literature, Fagen and Becker named the band after a "revolutionary" steam-powered dildo mentioned in the William S. Burroughs novel Naked Lunch.[16][17][18] Palmer joined as a second lead vocalist because of Fagen's occasional stage fright, his reluctance to sing in front of an audience, and because the label believed that his voice was not "commercial" enough.
In 1972, ABC issued Steely Dan's first single, "Dallas", backed with "Sail the Waterway". Distribution of "stock" copies available to the general public was apparently extremely limited;[19] the single sold so poorly that promotional copies are much more readily available than stock copies in today's collectors market. As of 2015, "Dallas" and "Sail the Waterway" are the only officially released Steely Dan tracks that have not been reissued on cassette or compact disc. In an interview (1995), Becker and Fagen called the songs "stinko."[20] "Dallas" was later covered by Poco on their Head Over Heels album.
Can't Buy a Thrill and Countdown to Ecstasy (1972–1973)
Can't Buy a Thrill, Steely Dan's debut album, was released in 1972. Its hit singles "Do It Again" and "Reelin' In the Years" reached No. 6 and No. 11 respectively on the Billboard singles chart. Along with "Dirty Work" (sung by David Palmer), the songs became staples on classic rock radio.
Because of Fagen's reluctance to sing live, Palmer handled most of the vocal duties on stage. During the first tour, however, Katz and Becker decided that they preferred Fagen's interpretations of the band's songs, persuading him to take over. Palmer quietly left the group while it recorded its second album. He wrote the No. 2 hit "Jazzman" (1974) with Carole King.
Released in 1973, Countdown to Ecstasy was not as commercially successful as Steely Dan's first album. Becker and Fagen were unhappy with some of the performances on the record and believed that it sold poorly because it had been recorded hastily on tour. The album's singles were "Show Biz Kids" and "My Old School", both of which stayed in the lower half of the Billboard charts (though "My Old School" and—to a lesser extent—"Bodhisattva" became minor FM Rock staples in time).
Pretzel Logic and Katy Lied (1974–1976)
Guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter left Steely Dan in 1974 when they ceased performing live and began working in the studio exclusively.
Pretzel Logic was released in early 1974. A diverse set, it includes the group's most successful single, "Rikki Don't Lose That Number" (No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100), and a note-for-note rendition of Duke Ellington and James "Bubber" Miley's "East St. Louis Toodle-Oo".
During the previous album's tour, the band had added vocalist-percussionist Royce Jones, vocalist-keyboardist Michael McDonald, and session drummer Jeff Porcaro.[21] Porcaro played the sole drum track on one song, "Night By Night" on Pretzel Logic (Jim Gordon played drums on all the remaining tracks, and he and Porcaro both played on "Parker's Band"), reflecting Steely Dan's increasing reliance on session musicians (including Dean Parks and Rick Derringer). Jeff Porcaro and Katy Lied pianist David Paich would go on to form Toto. Striving for perfection, Becker and Fagen sometimes asked musicians to record as many as forty takes of each track.[22]
Pretzel Logic was the first Steely Dan album to feature Walter Becker on guitar. "Once I met [session musician] Chuck Rainey", he explained, "I felt there really was no need for me to be bringing my bass guitar to the studio anymore".[22]
A rift began growing between Becker-Fagen and Steely Dan's other members (particularly Baxter and Hodder), who wanted to tour. Becker and Fagen disliked constant touring and wanted to concentrate solely on writing and recording. The other members gradually left the band, discouraged by this and by their diminishing roles in the studio. However, Dias remained with the group until 1980's Gaucho and Michael McDonald contributed vocals until the group's twenty-year hiatus after Gaucho. Baxter and McDonald went on to join The Doobie Brothers. Steely Dan's last tour performance was on July 5, 1974, a concert at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in California.[23]
Becker and Fagen recruited a diverse group of session players for Katy Lied (1975), including Porcaro, Paich, and McDonald, as well as guitarist Elliott Randall, jazz saxophonist Phil Woods, saxophonist/bass-guitarist Wilton Felder, percussionist/vibraphonist/keyboardist Victor Feldman, keyboardist (and later producer) Michael Omartian, and guitarist Larry Carlton—Dias, Becker, and Fagen being Steely Dan's only original members. The album went gold on the strength of "Black Friday" and "Bad Sneakers", but Becker and Fagen were so dissatisfied with the album's sound (compromised by a faulty DBX noise reduction system) that they publicly apologized for it (on the album's back cover) and for years refused to listen to it in its final form.[24] Katy Lied also included "Doctor Wu" and "Chain Lightning".
The Royal Scam and Aja (1976–1978)
The Royal Scam was released in May 1976. Partly because of Carlton's prominent contributions, it is the band's most guitar-oriented album. It also features performances by session drummer Bernard Purdie. The album sold well in the United States, though without the strength of a hit single. "Haitian Divorce" (Top 20) drove sales in the UK, becoming Steely Dan's first major hit in that country.[25] Steely Dan's sixth album, the jazz-influenced Aja, was released in September 1977. Aja reached the Top Five in the U.S. charts within three weeks, winning the Grammy award for "Engineer – Best Engineered Recording – Non-Classical." It was also one of the first American LPs to be certified 'platinum' for sales of over 1 million albums.[26][27]
Roger [Nichols] made those records sound like they did. He was extraordinary in his willingness and desire to make records sound better.[28] The records we did could not have been done without Roger. He was just maniacal about making the sound of the records be what we liked... He always thought there was a better way to do it, and he would find a way to do what we needed to in ways that other people hadn't done yet.[29]
~ Steely Dan producer Gary Katz regarding Roger Nichols' role in the band's recording legacy.
Featuring Michael McDonald's backing vocals, "Peg" (No. 11) was the album's first single, followed by "Josie" (No. 26) and "Deacon Blues" (No. 19). Aja solidified Becker's and Fagen's reputations as songwriters and studio perfectionists. It features such jazz and fusion luminaries as guitarists Larry Carlton and Lee Ritenour; bassist Chuck Rainey; saxophonists Wayne Shorter, Pete Christlieb, and Tom Scott; drummers Steve Gadd, Rick Marotta and Bernard Purdie; pianist Joe Sample and ex-Miles Davis pianist/vibraphonist Victor Feldman and Grammy award-winning producer/arranger Michael Omartian (piano).
Planning to tour in support of Aja, Steely Dan assembled a live band. Rehearsal ended and the tour was canceled when backing musicians began comparing pay.[30] The album's history was documented in an episode of the TV and DVD series Classic Albums.
After Aja's success, Becker and Fagen were asked to write the title track for the movie FM. The movie was a box-office disaster, but the song was a hit, earning Steely Dan another engineering Grammy award. It was a minor hit in the UK and barely missed the Top 20 in the U.S.A.[25]
Gaucho and breakup (1978–1981)
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Becker and Fagen took a break from songwriting for most of 1978 before starting work on Gaucho. The project would not go smoothly: technical, legal, and personal setbacks delayed the album's release and subsequently led Becker and Fagen to suspend their partnership for over a decade.
Misfortune struck early when an assistant engineer accidentally erased most of "The Second Arrangement", a favorite track of Katz and Nichols,[31] which was never recovered. More trouble — this time legal — followed. In March 1979, MCA Records bought ABC, and for much of the next two years Steely Dan could not release an album. Becker and Fagen had planned on leaving ABC for Warner Bros. Records, but MCA claimed ownership of their music, preventing them from changing labels.
Turmoil in Becker's personal life also interfered. His girlfriend died of a drug overdose in their Upper West Side apartment, and he was sued for $17 million. Becker settled out of court, but he was shocked by the accusations and by the tabloid press coverage that followed. Soon after, Becker was struck by a taxi while crossing a Manhattan street, shattering his right leg in several places and forcing him to use crutches.
Still more legal trouble was to come. Jazz composer Keith Jarrett sued Steely Dan for copyright infringement, claiming that they had based Gaucho's title track on one of his compositions, "Long As You Know You're Living Yours" (Fagen later admitted that he'd loved the song and that it had been a strong influence).[32]
Gaucho was finally released in November 1980. Despite its tortured history, it was another major success. The album's first single, "Hey Nineteen", reached No. 10 on the pop chart in early 1981, and "Time Out of Mind" (featuring guitarist Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits) was a moderate hit in the spring. "My Rival" was featured in John Huston's 1980 film Phobia. Roger Nichols won a third engineering Grammy award for his work on the album.
Time off (1981–1993)
Steely Dan disbanded in June 1981.[33] Becker and his family moved to Maui, where he became an "avocado rancher and self-styled critic of the contemporary scene."[34] He stopped using drugs, which he had used for most of his career.[35][36][37] Meanwhile, Fagen released a solo album, The Nightfly (1982), which went platinum in both the U.S. and the U.K. and yielded the Top Twenty hit "I.G.Y. (What a Beautiful World)." In 1988 Fagen wrote the score of Bright Lights, Big City and a song for its soundtrack, but otherwise recorded little. He occasionally did production work for other artists, as did Becker. The most prominent of these were two albums Becker produced for the British sophisti-pop group China Crisis, who were strongly influenced by Steely Dan.[38] Becker is listed as an official member of China Crisis on the first of these albums, 1985's Flaunt the Imperfection, and played keyboards on the band's Top 20 UK hit "Black Man Ray". For the second of the two albums, 1989's Diary of a Hollow Horse, Becker is only listed as a producer and not as a band member.
In 1986 Becker and Fagen performed on Zazu, an album by former model Rosie Vela produced by Gary Katz.[39] The two rekindled their friendship and held songwriting sessions between 1986 and 1987, leaving the results unfinished.[40] On October 23, 1991, Becker attended a concert by New York Rock and Soul Revue, co-founded by Fagen and producer/singer Libby Titus (who was for many years the partner of Levon Helm of The Band and would later become Fagen's wife), and spontaneously performed with the group.
Becker produced Fagen's second solo album, Kamakiriad, in 1993. Fagen conceived the album as a sequel to The Nightfly.[citation needed]
Reunion, Alive in America (1993–2000)
Steely Dan, shown here in 2007, toured frequently after reforming in 1993.
Becker and Fagen reunited for an American tour to support Kamakiriad, which sold poorly despite a Grammy nomination for Album of the Year. With Becker playing lead and rhythm guitar, the pair assembled a band that included a second keyboard player, second lead guitarist, bassist, drummer, vibraphonist, three female backing singers, and four-piece saxophone section. Among the musicians from the live band, several would continue to work with Steely Dan over the next decade, including bassist Tom Barney and saxophone players Cornelius Bumpus and Chris Potter. During this tour, Fagen introduced himself as "Rick Strauss" and Becker as "Frank Poulenc".
The next year, MCA released Citizen Steely Dan, a boxed set featuring their entire catalog (except their debut single "Dallas"/"Sail The Waterway") on four CDs, plus four extra tracks: "Here at the Western World" (originally released on 1978's "Greatest Hits"), "FM" (1978 single), a 1971 demo of "Everyone's Gone to the Movies" and "Bodhisattva (live)", the latter recorded on a cassette in 1974 and released as a B-side in 1980. That year Becker released his debut solo album, 11 Tracks of Whack, which Fagen co-produced.
Steely Dan toured again in support of the boxed set and Tracks. In 1995 they released a live CD, Alive in America, compiled from recordings of several 1993 and 1994 concerts. The Art Crimes Tour followed, including dates in the United States, Japan, and their first European shows in 22 years. After this activity, Becker and Fagen returned to the studio to begin work on a new album.
Two Against Nature and Everything Must Go (2000–2003)
In 2000 Steely Dan released their first studio album in 20 years: Two Against Nature. It won four Grammy Awards: Best Engineered Album – Non-Classical, Best Pop Vocal Album, Best Pop Performance by Duo or Group with Vocal ("Cousin Dupree"), and Album of the Year (despite competition in this category from Eminem's The Marshall Mathers LP and Radiohead's Kid A). In the summer of 2000, they began another American tour, followed by an international tour later that year. The tour featured guitarist Jon Herington, who would go on to play with the band over the next two decades. The group released the Plush TV Jazz-Rock Party DVD, documenting a live-in-the-studio concert performance of popular songs from throughout Steely Dan's career. In March 2001, Steely Dan was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.[5][6]
In 2003 Steely Dan released Everything Must Go. In contrast to their earlier work, they had tried to write music that captured a live feel. Becker sang lead vocals on a Steely Dan studio album for the first time ("Slang of Ages" — he had sung lead on his own "Book of Liars" on Alive in America). Fewer session musicians played on Everything Must Go than had become typical of Steely Dan albums: Becker played bass on every track and lead guitar on five tracks; Fagen added piano, electric piano, organ, synthesizers, and percussion on top of his vocals; touring drummer Keith Carlock played on every track.
Firing of Roger Nichols
In 2002 during the recording of Everything Must Go, Becker and Fagen fired their engineer Roger Nichols, who had worked with them for 30 years, without explanation or notification, according to band biographer Brian Sweet's 2018 revision of his book Reelin' in the Years.[41]
Touring, solo activity (2003–2017)
To complete his Nightfly trilogy, Fagen issued Morph the Cat in 2006. Steely Dan returned to annual touring that year with the Steelyard "Sugartooth" McDan and The Fab-Originees.com Tour.[42] Despite much fluctuation in membership, the live band featured mainstays Herrington, Carlock, bassist Freddie Washington, the horn section of Michael Leonhart, Jim Pugh, Roger Rosenberg, and Walt Weiskopf, and backing vocalists Carolyn Leonhart and Cindy Mizelle. The 2007 Heavy Rollers Tour included dates in North America, Europe, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, making it their most expansive tour.[43]
The smaller Think Fast Tour followed in 2008, with keyboardist Jim Beard joining the live band. That year Becker released a second album, Circus Money, produced by Larry Klein and inspired by Jamaican music. In 2009 Steely Dan toured Europe and America extensively in their Left Bank Holiday and Rent Party Tour, alternating between standard one-date concerts at large venues and multi-night theater shows that featured performances of The Royal Scam, Aja, or Gaucho in their entirety on certain nights. The following year, Fagen formed the touring supergroup Dukes of September Rhythm Revue with McDonald, Boz Scaggs, and members of Steely Dan's live band, whose repertoire included songs by all three songwriters. Longtime studio engineer Roger Nichols died of pancreatic cancer on April 10, 2011.[44] Steely Dan's Shuffle Diplomacy Tour that year included an expanded set list and dates in Australia and New Zealand. Fagen released his fourth album, Sunken Condos, in 2012. It was his first solo release unrelated to the Nightfly trilogy.
The Mood Swings: 8 Miles to Pancake Day Tour began in July 2013 and featured an eight-night run at the Beacon Theatre in New York City.[45] Jamalot Ever After, their 2014 United States tour, ran from July 2 in Portland, Oregon to September 20 in Port Chester, New York.[46] 2015's Rockabye Gollie Angel Tour included opening act Elvis Costello and the Imposters and dates at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. The Dan Who Knew Too Much tour followed in 2016, with Steve Winwood opening. Steely Dan also performed at The Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles with an accompanying orchestra.
The band played its final shows with Becker in 2017. In April, they played the 12-date Reelin' In the Chips residency in Las Vegas and Southern California.[47] Becker's final performance came on May 27 at the Greenwich Town Party in Greenwich, Connecticut.[48] Due to illness, Becker did not play Steely Dan's two Classics East and West concerts at Dodger Stadium and Citi Field in July.[49] Fagen embarked on a tour that summer with a new backing band, The Nightflyers.
After Becker's death (2017–present)
Becker died from complications of esophageal cancer on September 3, 2017.[50] In a note released to the media, Fagen remembered his longtime friend and bandmate, and promised to "keep the music we created together alive as long as I can with the Steely Dan band."[51] After Becker's death, Steely Dan honored commitments to perform a short North American tour in October 2017 and three concert dates in the United Kingdom and Ireland for Bluesfest on a double bill with the Doobie Brothers.[52] The band played its first concert following Becker's death in Thackerville, Oklahoma, on October 13.[52] In tribute to Becker, they performed his solo song "Book of Liars", with Fagen singing the lead vocals, at several concerts on the tour.[53]
Becker's widow and estate sued Fagen later that year, arguing that the estate should control 50% of the band's shares.[54] Fagen filed a counter suit, arguing that the band had drawn up plans in 1972 stating that band members leaving the band or dying relinquish shares of the band's output to the surviving members. In December, Fagen said that he would rather have retired the Steely Dan name after Becker's death, and would instead have toured with the current iteration of the group under another name, but was persuaded not to by promoters for commercial reasons.[55]
In 2018, Steely Dan performed on a summer tour of the United States with The Doobie Brothers as co-headliners.[56] The band also played a nine-show residency at the Beacon Theatre in New York City that October.[57] In February 2019, the band embarked on a tour of Great Britain with Steve Winwood.[58] Guitarist Connor Kennedy of The Nightflyers joined the live band, beginning with a nine-night residency at The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas in April 2019.[59]
On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed Steely Dan among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire.[60]
Musical and lyrical style
Music
Overall sound
Special attention is given to the individual sound of each instrument. Recording is done with the utmost fidelity and attention to sonic detail, and mixed so that all the instruments are heard and none are given undue priority. Their albums are also notable for the characteristically 'warm' and 'dry' production sound, and the sparing use of echo and reverberation.
Backing vocals
Becker and Fagen favored a distinctly soul-influenced style of backing vocals, which after the first few albums were almost always performed by a female chorus (although Michael McDonald features prominently on several tracks, including the 1975 song "Black Friday" and the 1977 song "Peg"). Venetta Fields, Sherlie Matthews and Clydie King were the preferred trio for backing vocals on the group's late 1970s albums.[61] Other backing vocalists include Timothy B. Schmit, Tawatha Agee, Brenda White-King, Carolyn Leonhart, Janice Pendarvis, Catherine Russell, Cynthia Calhoun, Victoria Cave, Cindy Mizelle, and Jeff Young. The band also featured singers like Patti Austin and Valerie Simpson on later projects such as Gaucho.
Horns
Horn arrangements have been used on songs from all Steely Dan albums. They typically feature instruments such as trumpets, trombones and saxophones, although they have also used other instruments such as flutes and clarinets. The horn parts occasionally integrate simple synth lines to alter the tone quality of individual horn lines; for example in "Deacon Blues" this was done to "thicken" one of the saxophone lines. On their earlier albums Steely Dan featured guest arrangers and on their later albums the arrangement work is credited to Fagen.
Composition and chord use
Steely Dan is famous for their use of chord sequences and harmonies that explore the area of musical tension between traditional pop sounds and jazz. In particular, they are known for their use of the add 2 chord, a type of added tone chord, which they nicknamed the mu major.[62][63][64] Other common chords used by Steely Dan include slash chords for example Bb/C or E7/A. This notation shows a chord (shown to the left of the slash) with a note other than the tonic (shown to the right of the slash) as the lowest pitched note.[65]
Lyrics
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Steely Dan's lyrical subjects are diverse, but in their basic approach they often create fictional personae that participate in a narrative or situation. The duo have said that in retrospect, most of their albums have a "feel" of either Los Angeles or New York City, the two main cities where Becker and Fagen lived and worked. Characters appear in their songs that evoke these cities. Steely Dan's lyrics are often puzzling to the listener,[66] with the true meaning of the song "uncoded" through repeated listening, and a richer understanding of the references within the lyrics. For example, in the song "Everyone's Gone to the Movies," the line "I know you're used to 16 or more, sorry we only have eight" refers not to the count of some article, but to eight-millimeter film, which was lower quality than 16 mm or larger formats, underscoring the illicitness of Mr. Lapage's movie parties.
Thematically, Steely Dan creates a universe peopled by losers, creeps and failed dreamers, often victims of their own obsessions and delusions. These motifs are introduced in the Dan's first hit song, "Do It Again," which contains a description of a murderous cowboy who beats the gallows, a man taken advantage of by a cheating girlfriend, and an obsessive gambler, all of whom are unable to command their own destinies; similar themes of being trapped in a death spiral of one's own making appear throughout their catalog. Other themes that they explore include prejudice, aging, poverty, and middle-class ennui.
Many would argue that Steely Dan never wrote a genuine love song, instead dealing with personal passion in the guise of a destructive obsession.[67] Many of their songs concern love, but typical of Steely Dan songs is an ironic or disturbing twist in the lyrics that reveals a darker reality. For example, expressed "love" is actually about prostitution ("Pearl of the Quarter"), incest ("Cousin Dupree"), pornography ("Everyone's Gone to the Movies"), or some other socially unacceptable subject.[68] However, some of their demo-era recordings show Fagen and Becker expressing romance, including "This Seat's Been Taken", "Oh, Wow, It's You" and "Come Back Baby".
Steely Dan's lyrics contain subtle and encoded references, unusual (and sometimes original) slang expressions, a wide variety of "word games." The obscure and sometimes teasing lyrics have given rise to considerable efforts by fans to explain the "inner meaning" of certain songs.[69][70] Jazz is a recurring theme, and there are numerous other film, television and literary references and allusions, such as "Home at Last" (from Aja), which was inspired by Homer's Odyssey.
Some of their lyrics are notable for their unusual meter patterns; a prime example of this is their 1972 hit "Reelin' In the Years", which crams an unusually large number of words into each line, giving it a highly syncopated quality.
"Name dropping" is another Steely Dan lyrical device; references to real places and people abound in their songs. The song "My Old School" is an example, referring to Annandale (Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, is home to Bard College, which both attended and where they met), and the Two Against Nature album (2000) contains numerous references to the duo's original region, the New York metro area, including the district of Gramercy Park, the Strand Bookstore, and the upscale food store Dean & DeLuca. In the song "Glamour Profession" the conclusion of a drug deal is celebrated with dumplings at Mr. Chow, a Chinese restaurant in Beverly Hills. The band even employed self-reference; in the song "Show Biz Kids," the titular subjects are sardonically portrayed as owning "the Steely Dan T-shirt."
The band also often name-checks drinks, typically alcoholic, in their songs: rum and cokes ("Daddy Don't Live in That New York City No More"), piña coladas ("Bad Sneakers"), zombies ("Haitian Divorce"), black cows ("Black Cow"), Scotch whisky ("Deacon Blues"), retsina ("Home at Last"), grapefruit wine ("FM"), cherry wine ("Time Out of Mind"), Cuervo Gold ("Hey Nineteen"), kirschwasser ("Babylon Sisters"), Tanqueray ("Lunch with Gina"), Cuban breeze (Fagen's solo track "The Goodbye Look"), and margaritas ("Everything Must Go") are all mentioned in Steely Dan lyrics.[71]
Members
Current members
Donald Fagen – lead vocals, keyboards (1972–1981, 1993–present)
Former members
Walter Becker – guitar, bass, backing and lead vocals (1972–1981, 1993–2017; his death)
Jeff "Skunk" Baxter – guitar, backing vocals (1972–1974)
Denny Dias – guitar (1972–1974, studio contributions until 1977)
Jim Hodder – drums, backing and lead vocals (1972–1974; died 1990)
David Palmer – backing and lead vocals (1972–1973)
Royce Jones – backing and lead vocals, percussion (1973–1974)
Michael McDonald – keyboards, backing vocals (1974, studio contributions until 1980)
Jeff Porcaro – drums (1974, studio contributions until 1980; died 1992)
I strive to take images that are a little different , they may not be commercial , or to every body's taste , but behavior is what really interests me.
Here a Snipe having a preen in front of the East Marsh at Brandon, again its a reach for the equipment on a small wader , so my experimental approach with the 2.0x plus 500mm continues. It leads to a lot of failures , but then to some captures that would be other wise not possible.
My advice is to push the equipment you have to the limit, when you have to , you may sometimes be pleasantly surprised by the results.
Camera Canon EOS-1D Mark IV
Exposure 0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture f/10.0
Focal Length 1000 mm
ISO Speed 1600
Exposure Bias +1/3 EV
Designer: Li Li (李立)
1978, September
Striving to modernize national defence
Wei guofang xiandaihua er fendou (为国防现代化而奋斗)
Call nr.: BG E15/631 (Landsberger collection)
More? See: chineseposters.net
"The St. Nicholas Historic District, known colloquially as "Striver's Row", is a historic district located on both sides of West 138th and West 139th Streets between Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard (Seventh Avenue) and Frederick Douglass Boulevard (Eighth Avenue) in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It is both a national and a New York City district, and consists of row houses and associated buildings designed by three architectural firms and built in 1891–93 by developer David H. King Jr. These are collectively recognized as gems of New York City architecture, and "an outstanding example of late 19th-century urban design":
There are three sets of buildings: The red brick and brownstone buildings on the south (even-numbered) side of West 138th Street and at 2350–2354 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard were designed by James Brown Lord in the Georgian Revival style; the yellow brick and white limestone with terra cotta trim buildings on the north (odd-numbered) side of 138th and on the south (even-numbered) side of 139th Street and at 2360–2378 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard were designed in the Colonial Revival style by Bruce Price and Clarence S. Luce; the dark brick, brownstone and terra cotta buildings on the north (odd-numbered) side of 139th Street and at 2380 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard were designed in the Italian Renaissance Revival style by Stanford White of the firm McKim, Mead & White.
The district was designated by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1967, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. The district's name reflects the nearby St. Nicholas Park.
David H. King Jr., the developer of what came to be called "Striver's Row", had previously been responsible for building the 1870 Equitable Building, the 1889 New York Times Building, the version of Madison Square Garden designed by Stanford White, and the Statue of Liberty's base. The townhouses in his new project, which were originally called the "King Model Houses", were intended for upper-middle-class whites, and featured modern amenities, dark woodwork, and views of City College. King's idea was that the project would be "on such a large scale and with such ample resources as to 'Create a Neighborhood' independent of surrounding influences."
The houses sit back-to-back, which allowed King to specify that they would share rear courtyards. The alleyways between them – a rarity in Manhattan – are gated off; some entrance gates still have signs that read "Walk Your Horses". At one time, these alleys allowed discreet stabling of horses and delivery of supplies without disrupting activities in the main houses. Today, the back areas are used almost exclusively for parking.
King sold very few houses and the development failed, with Equitable Life Assurance Society, which had financed the project, foreclosing on almost all the units in 1895, during an economic depression. By this time, Harlem was being abandoned by white New Yorkers, yet the company would not sell the King houses to blacks, and so they sat empty until 1919–20, when they were finally made available to African Americans for $8,000 each. Some of the units were turned into rooming houses, but generally they attracted both leaders of the black community and upwardly-mobile professionals, or "strivers", who gave the district its colloquial name.
Between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, is 139th Street, known among Harlemites as 'strivers' row.' It is the most aristocratic street in Harlem. Stanford White designed the houses for a wealthy white clientele. Moneyed African-Americans now own and inhabit them. When one lives on 'strivers' row' one has supposedly arrived. Harry Rills resides there, as do a number of the leading Babbitts and professional folk of Harlem.
By the 1940s, many of the houses had decayed and were converted to single room occupancies (SROs). Much of the original decorative detail inside the houses was lost at this time, though the exteriors generally remained unaltered. With the post-1995 real-estate boom in Harlem, many of these buildings are being restored to something resembling their original condition.
Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and Central Park North on the south. The greater Harlem area encompasses several other neighborhoods and extends west and north to 155th Street, east to the East River, and south to Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Central Park, and East 96th Street.
Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands. Harlem's history has been defined by a series of economic boom-and-bust cycles, with significant population shifts accompanying each cycle. Harlem was predominantly occupied by Jewish and Italian Americans in the 19th century, but African-American residents began to arrive in large numbers during the Great Migration in the 20th century. In the 1920s and 1930s, Central and West Harlem were the center of the Harlem Renaissance, a major African-American cultural movement. With job losses during the Great Depression of the 1930s and the deindustrialization of New York City after World War II, rates of crime and poverty increased significantly. In the 21st century, crime rates decreased significantly, and Harlem started to gentrify.
The area is served by the New York City Subway and local bus routes. It contains several public elementary, middle, and high schools, and is close to several colleges, including Columbia University, Manhattan School of Music, and the City College of New York. Central Harlem is part of Manhattan Community District 10. It is patrolled by the 28th and 32nd Precincts of the New York City Police Department. The greater Harlem area also includes Manhattan Community Districts 9 and 11 and several police precincts, while fire services are provided by four New York City Fire Department companies.
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over 300.46 square miles (778.2 km2), New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the United States. The city is within the southern tip of New York State, and constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area – the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass. With over 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York is one of the world's most populous megacities, and over 58 million people live within 250 mi (400 km) of the city. New York City is a global cultural, financial, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care and life sciences, entertainment, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, dining, art, fashion, and sports. New York is the most photographed city in the world. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy, an established safe haven for global investors, and is sometimes described as the capital of the world." - info from Wikipedia.
The fall of 2022 I did my 3rd major cycling tour. I began my adventure in Montreal, Canada and finished in Savannah, GA. This tour took me through the oldest parts of Quebec and the 13 original US states. During this adventure I cycled 7,126 km over the course of 2.5 months and took more than 68,000 photos. As with my previous tours, a major focus was to photograph historic architecture.
Now on Instagram.
King Model Houses
Renaissance Revival Row Houses (1891–93)
Architect: James Brown Lord
2350–52 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Blvd. (Seventh Ave.)
Strivers Row
Harlem, New York
In 1890, builder and real estate developer David H. King Jr. (1849–1916) purchased land along 138th and 139th streets in Harlem on which he would construct his King Model Houses. King had recently constructed the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty and would soon build the Washington Memorial Arch in Washington Square Park. Describing his housing project for the middle class, King declared, “the homes of New Yorkers [should] be sunny, tasteful, convenient, and commodious even if their occupants are not millionaires.”
To vary the look of each block, King hired three different architectural firms to construct 146 row houses and three apartment buildings. Unusual for New York, King included service alleys behind the rows of houses as well as cross alleys to break the monotony of the house fronts.
The architects retained by King were prominent in their day. James Brown Lord (1858–1902), who designed the houses on the south side of 138th St., also designed the old Delmonico’s Restaurant (1891) at Beaver and Williams streets in the Financial District and the Appellate Court on Madison Square (1902). Bruce Price (1845–1903) and Clarence S. Luce (1852–1924) designed the houses on the north side of 138th St and the south side of 139th St. Price would later design the Chateau Frontenac Hotel (1893) in Quebec City. The most famous architect associated with the project was Stanford White (1853–1906), who designed the houses on the north side of 139th St. White designed the Villard Houses (1884) on Madison Ave., the Cable Building at Broadway and Houston St. (1892), and the Washington Memorial Arch (1895).
Construction commenced in 1891, and the houses were completed in time for the Depression of 1893. The unexpected economic downturn led to only nine houses being sold by 1895. The mortgagee, the Equitable Life Assurance Co., took over the properties, selling thirty-one additional houses by 1905. The unsold houses were rented out.
From the 1890s to the 1910s, white middle-class professional and business people occupied the King Model Houses. Typically, five to ten people lived in each house with one or two servants. Acknowledging the changing demographics of the neighborhood, Equitable sold its remaining properties to black middle-class buyers in 1919 and 1920.
In the 1920s, most houses were occupied by a single family. Some eventually took in lodgers to defray costs, especially in the 1930s. By the 1930s, the two blocks had been dubbed “Strivers’ Row”. Originally meant as a insult, the name was embraced by residents in recognition of the fact that those who lived here were striving to better themselves. Today, the houses on these blocks are among the most desirable in Harlem.
© Matthew X. Kiernan
NYBAI13-5217
"The St. Nicholas Historic District, known colloquially as "Striver's Row", is a historic district located on both sides of West 138th and West 139th Streets between Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard (Seventh Avenue) and Frederick Douglass Boulevard (Eighth Avenue) in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It is both a national and a New York City district, and consists of row houses and associated buildings designed by three architectural firms and built in 1891–93 by developer David H. King Jr. These are collectively recognized as gems of New York City architecture, and "an outstanding example of late 19th-century urban design":
There are three sets of buildings: The red brick and brownstone buildings on the south (even-numbered) side of West 138th Street and at 2350–2354 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard were designed by James Brown Lord in the Georgian Revival style; the yellow brick and white limestone with terra cotta trim buildings on the north (odd-numbered) side of 138th and on the south (even-numbered) side of 139th Street and at 2360–2378 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard were designed in the Colonial Revival style by Bruce Price and Clarence S. Luce; the dark brick, brownstone and terra cotta buildings on the north (odd-numbered) side of 139th Street and at 2380 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard were designed in the Italian Renaissance Revival style by Stanford White of the firm McKim, Mead & White.
The district was designated by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1967, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. The district's name reflects the nearby St. Nicholas Park.
David H. King Jr., the developer of what came to be called "Striver's Row", had previously been responsible for building the 1870 Equitable Building, the 1889 New York Times Building, the version of Madison Square Garden designed by Stanford White, and the Statue of Liberty's base. The townhouses in his new project, which were originally called the "King Model Houses", were intended for upper-middle-class whites, and featured modern amenities, dark woodwork, and views of City College. King's idea was that the project would be "on such a large scale and with such ample resources as to 'Create a Neighborhood' independent of surrounding influences."
The houses sit back-to-back, which allowed King to specify that they would share rear courtyards. The alleyways between them – a rarity in Manhattan – are gated off; some entrance gates still have signs that read "Walk Your Horses". At one time, these alleys allowed discreet stabling of horses and delivery of supplies without disrupting activities in the main houses. Today, the back areas are used almost exclusively for parking.
King sold very few houses and the development failed, with Equitable Life Assurance Society, which had financed the project, foreclosing on almost all the units in 1895, during an economic depression. By this time, Harlem was being abandoned by white New Yorkers, yet the company would not sell the King houses to blacks, and so they sat empty until 1919–20, when they were finally made available to African Americans for $8,000 each. Some of the units were turned into rooming houses, but generally they attracted both leaders of the black community and upwardly-mobile professionals, or "strivers", who gave the district its colloquial name.
Between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, is 139th Street, known among Harlemites as 'strivers' row.' It is the most aristocratic street in Harlem. Stanford White designed the houses for a wealthy white clientele. Moneyed African-Americans now own and inhabit them. When one lives on 'strivers' row' one has supposedly arrived. Harry Rills resides there, as do a number of the leading Babbitts and professional folk of Harlem.
By the 1940s, many of the houses had decayed and were converted to single room occupancies (SROs). Much of the original decorative detail inside the houses was lost at this time, though the exteriors generally remained unaltered. With the post-1995 real-estate boom in Harlem, many of these buildings are being restored to something resembling their original condition.
Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and Central Park North on the south. The greater Harlem area encompasses several other neighborhoods and extends west and north to 155th Street, east to the East River, and south to Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Central Park, and East 96th Street.
Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands. Harlem's history has been defined by a series of economic boom-and-bust cycles, with significant population shifts accompanying each cycle. Harlem was predominantly occupied by Jewish and Italian Americans in the 19th century, but African-American residents began to arrive in large numbers during the Great Migration in the 20th century. In the 1920s and 1930s, Central and West Harlem were the center of the Harlem Renaissance, a major African-American cultural movement. With job losses during the Great Depression of the 1930s and the deindustrialization of New York City after World War II, rates of crime and poverty increased significantly. In the 21st century, crime rates decreased significantly, and Harlem started to gentrify.
The area is served by the New York City Subway and local bus routes. It contains several public elementary, middle, and high schools, and is close to several colleges, including Columbia University, Manhattan School of Music, and the City College of New York. Central Harlem is part of Manhattan Community District 10. It is patrolled by the 28th and 32nd Precincts of the New York City Police Department. The greater Harlem area also includes Manhattan Community Districts 9 and 11 and several police precincts, while fire services are provided by four New York City Fire Department companies.
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over 300.46 square miles (778.2 km2), New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the United States. The city is within the southern tip of New York State, and constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area – the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass. With over 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York is one of the world's most populous megacities, and over 58 million people live within 250 mi (400 km) of the city. New York City is a global cultural, financial, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care and life sciences, entertainment, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, dining, art, fashion, and sports. New York is the most photographed city in the world. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy, an established safe haven for global investors, and is sometimes described as the capital of the world." - info from Wikipedia.
The fall of 2022 I did my 3rd major cycling tour. I began my adventure in Montreal, Canada and finished in Savannah, GA. This tour took me through the oldest parts of Quebec and the 13 original US states. During this adventure I cycled 7,126 km over the course of 2.5 months and took more than 68,000 photos. As with my previous tours, a major focus was to photograph historic architecture.
Now on Instagram.
Not a macro, this ship chain was HUGE. Found in the Rivertown section of detroit while out with my buddy Sccot, we came across a parking lot filled with buoys. You don't realize how large they are until you stand next to one.
Strive for good deeds, even the small ones—you never know which one will get you into Jannah.
Dr. Bilal Philips
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We are centrally located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. So we can easily service all of Canada and the USA and do it at reasonable shipping costs and great value to our U.S. customers right now with their dollar being so high!
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76/365 - "Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value." ~Albert Einstein
A collection of daisies by the roadside, ignored by all except bees and curious photographers.
Erin Gruwell and the Freedom Writers. Akko Nov.-Dec. 2016. The U.S. Embassy partnered with ORT Israel and the Israeli Ministry of Education to bring teacher, author and founder of the Freedom Writers Foundation, Erin Gruwell and four original Freedom Writers – Narada, Carlos, Sue Ellen and Shanita – to Israel, to conduct a four-day intensive workshop in Akko with 26 Israeli educators from diverse communities. This was the first time the Freedom Writers have brought their unique methodology, previously taught only at the Freedom Writers Foundation in Long Beach, California, to another country. Ms. Julie Fisher, wife of the U.S. Ambassador welcomed Erin and her Freedom Writers to Israel, and thanked them for their conviction and belief in teachers and students all over the globe. Israelis can relate to Erin’s incredible story: no matter how dismal the situation may seem, by supporting one another, communicating, respecting, and learning from one another, we can strive for a peaceful future together. Through the "Freedom Writers Diary," a compilation of the journals that the Freedom Writers wrote, Erin and her Freedom Writers brought their personal stories to life for the 26 Israeli educators. Tears of joy and sorrow were shared as the teachers became students for four days and learned how to dig deep and express their inner emotions, and draw support from one another. Erin inspired the educators, she showed them how to achieve a higher purpose in life, how to become even more effective role models, and how to empower their students by listening, believing, and giving – as she herself had done for 150 teenagers who had given up hope, but regained it when she gave them a voice.
“If you change a classroom, you can change a community, and if you change enough communities, you can change the world” – Erin Gruwell
Hyatt Regency Indian Wells Resort & Spa
44600 Indian Wells Ln,
Indian Wells, CA 92210
*** In the beginning ***
In 1967 Charlie Pasarell, was 23 and was ranked No 1 U.S. tennis player. When Pasarell turned 35 he determined he was not good enough to play competitively with the younger players. So, he decided to promote a tennis circuit for those over 35 and it would be called the Grand Champions. Albert DeVaul, who developed the Racquet Club at Scottsdale Ranch in Arizona, hosted one of the Pasarell's Grand Champions tournaments and was pleased with the success. These two became friends then partners - a relationship that eventually led to the $70 million resort in Indian Wells - The Grand Champions, now known as Hyatt Regency Indian Wells Resort & Spa.
In 1977 Pasarell was director of tennis for Ernie Vossler's Landmark Land Co., which re-developed the La Quinta Hotel Golf & Tennis Resort. Vossler and Pasarell wanted to re-imagine the La Quinta Resort as a world class tennis resort. With Pasarell on board as tennis director the resort’s tennis club was born. In 1981, La Quinta Resort & Club hosted its first major professional tennis tournament, the Grand Marnier/ATP Tennis Games (now the BNP Paribas Open). The first tournament ended with Jimmy Connors defeating Ivan Lendl. The 1981 total prize money was $175,000 with $28,000 to the singles winner. Attendance for the Sunday finals was 6,600.
During the six years (1981 – 1986) the tournament was held in La Quinta, the event achieved such success that it outgrew the tennis stadium and facilities at La Quinta Hotel. Charlie Pasarell’s goal was to strive for “major tennis event” status. He knew what was needed - a larger, more modern and permanent tennis stadium with enhanced facilities. To construct the appropriate tennis stadium and facilities, Pasarell and long-time friend and former player Raymond Moore established a company known as PM Sports Management, and created a team along with other investors including Albert DeVaul and entertainer Alan King to design, develop and operate a luxurious resort hotel and tennis facility. At that time the city of Indian Wells had three hotel sites available on Highway 111 adjacent to the city-funded 36-hole golf course. The golf courses were not to be known as public or municipal rather the courses were to be called resort or world class. Pasarell's group committed to a site but the city of Indian Wells would only allow a stadium with 4,000 permanent seats. In a work around Pasarell and the city agreed to a stadium built that was terraced on the bottom and had 4,000 permanent seats built around the upper ring. Pasarell plan was to rent 10.000 folding chairs, at a dollar apiece to make the 14,000 seat total.
For financing Pasarell and DeVaul sold an ownership portion of the Indian Wells hotel/tennis project to Brad Blackman, at the time a 34 year old president of Blackman, Garlock Flynn & Co., a San Francisco based real estate investment firm. A company - The Grand Champions Resorts - a California limited partnership, was formed with Brad Blackman named Chairman, Charles Pasarell president and investors including Alan King, VMS Realty and Primerica. Expansion beyond Indian Wells was promising with future plans for Grand Champions projects in Aspen, Polo Beach on Maui and Peter Island in the British Virgin Islands. It was Brad Blackman's relationship with Wolgang Puck that brought Puck to the Grand Champions to develop the food and beverage concepts. Brad Blackman also steered Puck to open Postrio at 545 Post Street in San Francisco.
In 1986, construction was completed on the 350-room Grand Champions Hotel (now known as the Hyatt Regency Indian Wells Resort & Spa). The hotel is strongly reminiscent of La Mamounia, a great old hotel in Marrakech, Morocco. Morocco was one of the last stops on a three-year resort-hopping project that Charles Pasarell, Albert DeVaul and architect Bob Yamafuji undertook to come up with the resort's design. Development costs were reported to be $70 million - and up to $120 million. Its centerpiece was a sophisticated tennis center with 12 courts including a 10,000-seat tennis stadium (with some 7,000 permanent seats and 12 private sponsor suites), a 3,000-seat clubhouse court, two grass courts and two clay courts. Other facilities included a 3,000 square foot retail sport boutique, a 1.62-acre hospitality village and an 8,000 square foot convention center that also served as a media facility, a player’s lounge and a kitchen facility during the tournament. At the time it was completed, the stadium and facilities were truly state-of-the-art. The entertainer Alan King's job title was Vice Chairman of Entertainment and Special Events. King said he owned 3% of the hotel. Tennis great Boris Becker was to represent Grand Champions as its touring pro.
Bernard Dervieux was the opening chef. He left after one year (replaced by Marco Barbitta) to open Cuistot on El Paseo. Bernard was hired in 1980 at the Beverly Hills Hotel at the recommendation of Wolfgang Puck. He was Executive Chef at the hotel until 1986. After leaving the Beverly Hills Hotel, Bernard went to the Grand Champions Resort in Indians Wells and also to Aspen, Colorado serving as Executive Chef until opening Cuistot in 1987. The hotel opened with three restaurants: Trattoria - exhibition kitchen in the style of Puck's Spago, California regional with pizzas, pastas salads. Charlies - traditional classic dishes from the south of France with no cream and no butter. The Jasmine Room - the premier dining room offering a mix of French, Nouvelle and fine American cuisine. The opening manager for Jasmine was Pasquale Pavone who previously was maitre d'hotel at the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel for 11 years. Zapotec, a South American restaurant designed by Barbara Lazaroff, Puck's wife, was to be in a separate building on the Hyatt grounds.
In November 1987, one year after opening, Hyatt Hotels Corp commenced managing the Grand Champions Hotel. Rudy Richters, Neil B. Jacobs and Rick Redman were early general managers. Rudy Richter's previous general manager positions include the Dolder Hotel in Zurich, the Park in Vienna and L'ermitage in Beverly Hills. At the time VMS Realty had a strong relationship with Hyatt.
By 1989 VMS Realty, one of the nation's largest real estate firms, was suffering cash-flow problems and in an attempt to avoid bankruptcy replaced its top management and laid off some of its 500 employees. The Chicago-based partnership, which had a $9 billion portfolio that included Hyatt Grand Champions, said it would sell properties, seek to renegotiate bank loans and take a $110 million charge against third-quarter earnings. VMS, which began as a seller of real estate limited partnerships, partners were Robert Van Kampen, Peter R. Morris and Joel A. Stone (thus VMS). Limited partnerships, particularly in real estate, were the principal forms of tax shelters until the Tax Reform Act of 1986 effectively eliminated most of the tax benefits. As a result, a number of syndicators have left the syndication business entirely or filed for bankruptcy.
*** Richard L. Monfort ownership ***
Ken Monfort sold the family business, Monfort of Colorado, to ConAgra for $300 million in 1987. The cattle company was one of Greeley's largest employers and one of the world's largest beef operations. In 1989 VMS Realty was failing and a son of Ken Monfort, Richard L. Monfort, became a shareholder in the VMS owned Hyatt Grand Champions along with the Hyatt Hotel Corporation. Dick Monfort also owns the Colorado Rockies Baseball Club and was the owner of Boston's now closed Highland Steakhouse, once the highest grossing steakhouse in the U.S.
Australian tennis pro Mark Philippoussis won the 1999 Newsweek Champions Cup - it marked the last singles championship to be played on the 11,500-seat stadium at the Hyatt Grand Champion Resort. The 2000 tournanent moved to the Indian Wells Tennis Garden, Charlie Pasarell's new tennis mecca with a 16,100 seat stadium. According to Pasarell the Indian Wells tournament had grown to be among the most prestigious sports events in the world and had totally outgrown the facilities at the Hyatt Grand Champions.
In 2003 owner Dick Monfort completed a $60 million expansion at the Hyatt Grand Champions Resort. The project began with the demolition of the 10,100 seat tennis stadium and a reduction of tennis courts from 12 to 3. The expansion included 142 guest rooms making the room count 480, a new 50,000 sq ft meeting facility and a 30,000 sq ft floating spa paradise, Agua Serena. John Orr, divisional vice president for Hyatt Hotels gave credit to Dick Monfort's perseverance for bringing this enhancement to fruitation. The General Manager at that time was Hendrick Santos. Santos later ran the Westin Rio Mar and the Gran Melia Golf Resort in Puerto Rico. Tom Netting was the VP and Managing Director during 2004-2007.
During 2005-06 the city of Indian Wells decided to plow under the two 19 year-old golf courses in a $45 million enhancement project. Clive Clark and John Fought were retained to completely re-do the Ted Robinson designed East Course and West Course along with the construction of a new clubhouse. Since 2006 the Indian Well's Golf Resort annual losses have exceeded a total of $20 million. In 1998, the former Erawan Garden Hotel was transformed beyond recognition into the Miramonte Resort. Together with the Hyatt Grand Champions, Indian Wells Resort Hotel, and Renaissance Esmeralda, the four properties were successful in generating room taxes that are more than 60% of the city of Indian Wells' operating budget.
In 2011 the Hyatt's general manager was Allan Farwell. He closed the resort during the month of July to facilitate the renovation of the resorts main entrance, lobby and front desk. Also the reconcepting and renaming of the former Santa Rosa Grill to Lantana Restaurant and lobby bar Agave Sunset were completed. The hotel temporarily closed its doors in July of 2012 to begin constructing the Citrus Marketplace and Cafe. During his 6 years in Indian Wells Farwell served as Chairman of the California Hotel and Lodging Association and Chairman of the Palm Springs Desert Resort Convention and Visitors Bureau.
In 2012, the resort changed its name from Hyatt Grand Champions to Hyatt Regency Indian Wells Resort & Spa. Doug Sears was the general manager from 2013 to 2017. In Oct 2017 Stephen D’Agostino was named general manager. D’Agostino most recently was general manager of Hyatt Regency Orange County.
Compiled by Dick Johnson, October 2018
the test have been many and they are not abating,
we crossed the bridge we would not be able to return on,
camped awhile on the river bank to collected our inner notion,
overdue now if not stepping up,
striving out into unknown territory,
bravely forging new pathways through unknown lands,
courage piled high and leaving old baggage behind,
trusting leaps of faith,
as the light of Ridvan shines the way
Keeping Your EYES Healthy
Your eyes may be the window to your soul,
but they're also your main doorway to the world around you.
Something most of us take for granted unless something goes wrong.
Our eyes are truly amazing, functioning like a
high-tech video camera attached to a supercomputer.
Science has not even come close in replicating them.
To keep your eyes healthy and functioning optimally,
especially with age, you must get regular eye checkups.
Problems like glaucoma, cataracts, and even diabetes
(or diabetes-related eye problems) can be
picked up early and managed, preventing bigger problems down the line.
In terms of everyday activities, take frequent breaks
from computer screens to avoid eye strain.
Don't forget your sunglasses outdoors, which help
protect your eyes from UV damage.
When sports call for eye protection, wear
the appropriate gear, glasses, or goggles.
And remember, what you put in your mouth affects your eyes.
Strive to eat foods rich in vitamin A and beta carotene,
such as cooked carrots, tomatoes, and green leafy vegetables.
Include fish in your diet and seek out other good sources of omega-3s.
An orange a day keeps the eye doctor away.
Your eyes are just as important -- keep them healthy!
My future lays before me, sir
Darkened by uncertainty,
Yet lighted by opportunity.
My future is my own, sir
And I shall ever reach for it.
2018 HLPF Side Event on Shaping Smarter and More Sustainable Cities: Striving for Sustainable Development Goals" held on 12 July 2018 in New York provided a platform to debate the impact of frontier technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, and Internet of Things (IoT) on cities, to present current national and international initiatives such as the United for Smart Sustainable Cities and to discuss the challenges and opportunities faced in shaping smart and sustainable cities at the local level.
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