Uncle Fun and Sparky Land

     No, that isn’t a hat Mr. Cousins is wearing. This is the way his hair grows out when he has other things on his mind than having it cut (having his hair cut, that is, not his mind...that's been pretty much pared down to the bone already). All of us have been otherwise occupied lately: right now, I’m occupied with giving you an apology for the tardy and scattershot nature of the remarks which follow.

     The illustration above was inspired by (and drawn at) the University of Toronto’s Festival of Original Theatre (a.k.a. “FOOT”), where Mr. Cousins successfully defended his title of Single Strangest Person to Speak at an Academic Conference Without Mentioning Any Theory Related to Post-Structuralism. By all accounts, his presentation went well. I credit this to a series of judicious and well-timed appearances by myself and Sparky, which furnished badly-needed clarification, and kept things rolling along. (They really got rollin’ when he started swearin’ an’ chuckin’ things at us. –Sparky)  Although there is no video or audio record of this little firesign chat, there is a rumour that it may one day be published in a collection of works derived from the conference proceedings. There is every chance that rumour will become reality, since it’s the one rumour concerning the weekend’s events that wasn’t started by Sparky.

(I resemble that remark. –Sparky)  

     Again, my apologies—in particular for my laxity as a correspondent, and for Sparky in general. (By the way, Sparky—you really should have known that there’s a by-law against referring to the author of Understanding Media as “Marshall McClueless” within fifty metres of the University of Toronto campus…civic pride for a hometown boy made good, and all that.)

     I would have reported on all this to you sooner, but our return to Funsville from The Big Smoke (if anyone still refers to Toronto by that nickname) saw us caught up in the annual whirlwind that is the run-up to the festivities that commence with the Ray Manzarek’s Birthday Jubilee on Feb. 12 and end with Residents' Day on whichever Monday follows it. (Click here for the posting that explains, as best as can be expected, what all that involves.) As is my privilege this and every year, I am emceeing the Ray Manzarek’s Birthday Promenade Concert and Celebrity Funkfest. Unfortunately, preparations for the event have unravelled somewhat, due to the late delivery of the sheet music for the evening’s main showpiece—transcriptions of Debussy’s “Children’s Corner Suite” for four-handed Vox Continental organ and Fender Rhodes keyboard bass. Things have consequently, shall we say, gone to hectic in a handbasket. The organizing committee has decreed that this is absolutely, positively the last time they commission works from anyone who advertises on Kijiji.

     Speaking of matters musical, while in Toronto, visiting his friend, the composer and lively arts polymath Alex Eddington, Mr. Cousins learned that his handiwork was circulating in places other than a campus lecture theatre. The Canadian Music Centre, a repository for all things progressively Canuckish in orchestral, chamber and art music, has picked up on Cousins’ animation of “Countdown”, one of Mr. Eddington’s vocal compositions, and is proudly displaying it on their website. Or it will be, once the site is no longer undergoing maintenance. For the time being, you can see it here, for the low cost of one quick click on these blue letters...or these ones...or these ones.

     Being tangentially referred to in circles where actually important artistic activity takes place naturally made Mr. Richard J. Cousins, Esq. humbly proud. It’s not everyone who can boast of being a footnote in the grand narrative of a nation’s culture. It also brings to mind a cultural footnote which was in the news this week, involving another rather better-known and certainly more well-liked man named Richard. A team of historians and facial reconstruction experts (It’s always a team, izzent it? One guy cooden jus’ come up wit’ this stuff in his basement an’ keep ta himself. –Sparky) …er, yes, well, they’ve unearthed the remains of Richard III and, using methods like what you’d see on CSI, have painstakingly reassembled a definitive version of what the much-maligned English monarch actually looked like.

 

 

     It seemed to me I’d seen this face somewhere before. A quick rummage through Mr. Cousins’ pile of oddball British comedy on VHS and DVD (by me. –Sparky) unearthed the answer. Forgotten and dismissed (and deservedly so) for a host of reasons, the false start at creating a trademark persona for Rowan Atkinson which goes under the title of The Black Adder nonetheless has a character who could pass for the New and Improved Richard III in conditions more exacting than a dark alley or a blind date. No, it’s NOT their version of Richard III:

 

 

     I’m not sure if this family resemblance puts the line of succession of British royalty into question, sheds valuable light on the unseen influences behind historical revisions, or just illustrates the value of being lazy and watching a lot of TV. Team Richard III won’t have time to ponder any of these matters—they have more urgent and valuable work to do. I hear the next item on their agenda is determining the current depreciation on the exchange rate of a kingdom for a horse.

Uncle Fun

P.S. Because you also haven’t had much in the way of listening material from us lately, I’m going to link you to a short fable, read by Mr. C in one of his gallery of guises. “The Engineer and the Bumblebee” seems appropriate for a posting with a recap of a scholarly conference—it’s all about what happens when Big Ideas are tripped up by Annoying Little Facts…well, more or less.