And Something to Listen To

Here is a sampling of a very pleasant CD entitled Cello Suite Number 2 in D Minor and Other Selections, "Other Selections" being bits from other of Bach's cello suites. Including The One, to my great satisfaction. The twist--they aren't played on cello here, but on mandola, the mandolin's more robust brother. Such picked instruments have a natural inclination to sound a bit abrupt in contrast to bowed instruments so I was quite impressed with the resonant quality of the playing here that is so well suited to the subject matter.

Something to Look At

Those pictures of a brilliant night sky set in contrast to a landscape get me every time. But this was the first one I'd seen that featured a peculiarly Tehachapian twist to the landscape. I've heard the grass in the foreground called "wild rye." I don't know how accurate that is, but where it has taken over, it grows with a quite pleasing generosity, and rolls like surf when the wind blows across it. The oak, for them as takes note of such things, is probably Quercus lobata.