Fallen Avocados 6

An ancient venerated Mixed Meters tradition: pictures of avocados which have fallen from trees and have often been nibbled at by squirrels. If you want to see the entire Fallen Avocado series Click Here.



And speaking of "series" ...

It's an MM tradition to provide music videos to accompany Fallen Avocado pictures. Here are two videos about ugly new music - the first one from the century just ended and the second one from many centuries ago. Enjoy.

And as a bonus - here's a Gershwin/Schoenberg Mashup. Fantastic!!

Click the picture for an enlargement. It reminds me of a certain planet with one moon.

Fallen Tags: Fallen Avocados. . . twelve tone. . . perfect intervals. . . Gershwin Schoenberg

Fallen Avocados 5

Fallen Avocados, an ancient Mixed Meters regular feature, is back from its long hiatus. Sort of like Indiana Jones.

See all the Fallen Avocados episodes by clicking on this sentence.

For those of you who don't remember what Fallen Avocados was, the format is to combine a picture of an avocado which has fallen from a tree (and is often half-eaten and which I photograph just as I find it) with some video or other link, the sort that you might get in an email from an annoying friend.

Fallen avocados are a common sight in Pasadena. And in other places as well, I'm sure. The avocados have often been a meal for wild animals such as squirrels or raccoons or possums or our dog Chowderhead, who isn't actually wild. Our neighbor's avocado tree drops avocados into our back yard and I say "the backyard feeds our dog automatically".


This video link is to a compendium of all the Simpson's television show couch gags. The "couch gag" is that little bit of the Simpsons introduction just after Homer is chased through the garage by Marge's bad driving and the whole family tries to sit down on the couch in front of the television. Generally each episode has a different couch gag. The compilation goes on for a while. It's like the funniest episode ever.

Be sure to listen to the sound track as you watch - the constant repetition of the same bit of music from Danny Elfman's brilliant theme is interrupted occasionally by bits of pop culture music. What a wonderfully unpretentious minimalist score. Too bad minimalist pieces in concerts don't have a similarly free spirit.

Here and here and here are some MM posts which reference the Simpsons.

Fallen Couch Gag Tags: fallen avocados. . . Simpsons. . . couch gags. . . video

Fallen Avocados 4

• A piano player in a high class men's room?
• Driving a baby grand on the streets (and waterways) of London?

Check out this video The Ad Lav Club with Dudley Moore at the keyboard, Peter Cook as the American television interviewer Hiram Pipesucker who impersonates the Duke and Duchess of Windsor (sorta), and John Lennon as the doorman.

Meanwhile, if you need to brush up on the personalities (and psychoses) of orchestra members (as seen by a conductor), read The Honest Person's Guide to the Orchestra (or try this link)

It has helpful info like:

• Woodwind players have IQs in the low-to-mid-genius range. Nerds with coke-bottle glasses and big egos,
• People who play the cello are simply not good looking.
• The clarinet is, without a doubt, the easiest of all orchestral instruments to play.

Tags you're it: Avocado Peter Cook Dudley Moore John Lennon orchestra

Fallen Avocados 3

Something I wonder about: Why is the CIA running Help Wanted advertisements on Fox Television during the Simpsons? Just what sort of people are they looking for? Someone like me?

LINK: Here's more help for lazy music students - learn to play the guitar, the electric bass and the drums all at the same time by watching this exceptional "video" (or "tape" or "show") called Three Piece Band - Kel McKeown splices 3 instructional videos (It's the one in the center; I've linked to it before - Maths, the video at the top, is a pleasant bit of English weirdness.)

PICTURE: Avocado, small and green, seeks hungry Squirrel.


Tags Avocado CIA videomashup advertising Kel McKeown

Fallen Avocados 2

Today's Link, more help for the harried music professor - this in the form of the 1953 Walt Disney wide-screen animated orchestration text Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom - in about ten minutes your students will learn everything they need.

Some background (including "Disney vs. the union" history) is available at This is Not My Blog. I can't tell if anyone was even credited for the pleasingly out-there multi-stylistic score.

Today's Picture - another squirrel meal, served on a bed of (mostly) fresh greens.



Tags: animation Disney avocado orchestration

Lowered Expectation - Fallen Avocados 1

In a time of deadlines here's a new MMF (Mixed Meters Feature) - The Lowered Expectation: one picture, one link, no rhyme, no reason, more often.

Link: Are you a professor of music history unprepared for your lecture on late 20th century electronic music? Play this piece for the little urchins and take some time off: Raiding the 20th Century by DJ Food. Always fascinating, completely illegal, mildly instructive, occasionally beyond brilliant.



Picture: squirrel food on our driveway

Tags that don't work:Mixed Meters DJ Food Avocado
Tags that do work:Mixed Meters DJ Food Avocado