And by the way, is it "to music" or "to musick"?
So I scrapped the idea of coming back to the US this summer and getting a job. In the end it came down to hours of sweaty toil in summer camp or office for maybe $2500 if I'm lucky vs. potentially life-changing summer in Africa with my family plus, in effect, crash course in Arabic. Not a hard choice really. For political reasons, I'm not going to state on this blog the specific location or even the exact nation in which I will be living. But it's in Africa, yes.
Also, I found out Stanford is sending me 3 books to read over the summer and reflect upon. We'll chew them over in small groups during freshman orientation, and then they'll set up a moderated discussion with the authors! I am jazzed. The books are The Kite Runner, Mountains Beyond Mountains, and How to Breathe Underwater. Their Amazon.com pages suggest great promise.
OK, TASP mini-discussion about Dylan's observation on the possible transitivity of the verb "to musick" and subsequent comments:
My opinion: After some more reflection, I am convinced that "to musick" must be intransitive and intransitive alone. The existence of an intransitive case is pretty easy to accept - remember the cleaning lady from Musicking who sweeps the floor of the concert hall? She's musicking, right? But she's not musicking the concert hall or any other object. So musicking can be intransitive QED. But can "to musick" ever be transitive? If so, the big question is what do you musick? Let's look at Dylan's example, "Joe picks up his CD player and starts musicking a little Bob Dylan." Is Joe musicking Bob Dylan the person here? Maybe so, but that doesn't really work - why then the need for the phrase "a little"? Rather, the implication is that Joe is musicking a little music by Bob Dylan. This usage defeats the purpose of the word musicking: remember, the whole point was to get rid of that nasty reified noun, "music." Besides, it sounds silly to music music. If you want to go around musicking things other than music (say Joe really wants to musick Bob Dylan himself), then musicking can be transitive, but in this context I'm not sure what you mean. Intransitive usage seems like the only really meaningful kind.
Top 5:
5. More than a Feeling - Boston
4. Breakfast at Igor's - Spyro Gyra
3. Leaving on a Jet Plane - Peter, Paul, and Mary
2. Keep the Customer Satisfied - Simon & Garfunkel
1. Highway Star - Deep Purple
Groetjes,
Sam
posted by Sam at 3:45 PM
7 Comments:
Kite Runner is the book of the year in my opinion. You'll LOVE it.
5:48 PM, May 28, 2006
Wow, your location is for-eyes-only? Doesn't that concern you just a little bit?
7:42 PM, May 28, 2006
any chance you can e-mail us with your address?
7:55 PM, May 28, 2006
I think that the verb is actually "to music" and that the k only enters (historical precedent and all) when it becomes a participle, but I digress.
I'm leaning toward accepting your argument. But what about saying "music a song" or "music a symphony?" You would be designating the length and nature of the musicking. Musicking a song could be singing it, listening to it, or cleaning the stage on which it is sung. The concert hall cleaning lady musics symphonies and concertos. I guess it would still emphasize the musical work a little too much though...
Then there's the possibility of musicking a genre. Can you music hip-hop? Classical? Rock 'n' Roll? Or would that be "musicking in the hip-hop style" or "in the classical style?"
4:50 PM, May 29, 2006
Oh my gosh, Paul Farmer is my mum's hero! Mountains Beyond Mountains is pretty dang sweet.
6:30 PM, May 29, 2006
btw, Dylan is right with the absence of the 'k': think "frolic"
8:42 PM, May 29, 2006
Dylan - following on my interpretation of Bern's excellent "to music, v.t." definition (see my comment to his post above), you are right about that cleaning lady - she does music symphonies and concertos. No caveats necessary. Still not sure about musicking a genre though - can a genre really be a component of a musical performance?
Charles and Bern - The undisclosed nature of my location this summer is actually much less exciting than it sounds, but I'm happy to (and allowed to) give you the specifics of the situation in a private email as long as it will not be published publicly. If you're curious, just pop me a note and I'll get back to you.
And Ridley - I don't think I've ever heard the word "groetjes" (means something like "greetings") pronounced. Its chief role in the Dutch language is as an informal ending to a quick note. But I'm pretty sure I know how it would be pronounced: the "g" is a difficult sound unique to Dutch and in the back of your throat (I'd say it's something like the ch sound in Hebrew - my mom says she just makes a gargling noise), "r" is hard like in Spanish, "oe" is a long "ooh" sound, "tj" is like "tch", e is an umlaut, and s is like a z. So to sum up, something like this: *gargle*-ROO-tchuhz. :)
9:50 AM, May 31, 2006
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