Hojotoho!

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In a comment to yesterday's post, our friend Cieldequimper asked who were the other composers in the circle around the gazebo. Well, they all wrote operas (although Beethoven, whom we just saw, wrote the fewest of the lot, producing just one), three spoke German, two spoke Italian, one spoke French and all reflected highbrow Midwestern taste in the late 19th Century.

So, knowing a straight line when I hear one, I think we'll move through the collection. Richard Wagner, a disagreeable genius, is well-placed in this HDR-pumped sky. I was once in Los Angeles on business and went to hear Tristan und Isolde by myself at the L.A. Opera. I walked back to the parking lot next to one of the members of the orchestra, who asked me if I actually liked it. I told him I was ecstatic. And then there was the time I heard Jon Vickers sing Parsifal in Chicago. I could go on.

And speaking of Wagner, do you like the smell of napalm in the morning?


YOUR ASSISTANCE PLEASE: It's almost time for the 2009 travel photo competition sponsored by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. I've won a couple of honorable mentions but never one of the top three prizes. This is a selection favorite photos from around the country and the world this year. Please leave me a comment and let me know which one you would submit. Remember, this is a general-interest daily newspaper so nothing too weird. Click here for the set.