My Little Sondheim!

Okay, I confess -- I have become a fan of the latest incarnation of the My Little Pony TV show, called My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. No, I haven't lost my mind. The show's popularity among adult men has taken the show's creators by complete surprise. We're called "bronies," and if you want more background on the topic, here's the famous Wired article about us. It's really very simple -- Lauren Faust, the force behind the show, trashed the saccharine sweetness of older My Little Pony shows and replaced it with sharper humor and the same girl-power sensibility she brought from her work with her husband Craig McCracken on his hit show, The Powerpuff Girls. (Faust also worked as an animator on two wonderful animated feature films, The Iron Giant (directed by Pixar veteran Brad Bird) and a forgotten treat, Cats Don't Dance (directed by Mark Dindal, who went on to direct Disney's hugely funny The Emperor's New Groove).) Faust has managed to make the new My Little Pony show innocent and fun without condescension or over-cuteness. It's more enjoyable than you might imagine, and yes, I cannot believe I am singing the praises of a TV show based on those silly toys from the 80s!

What does this have to do with the video above? Simply that I love semi-obscure references, in this case creating a parody (in the old-style sense) of a song by Stephen Sondheim for one of the episodes of MLP: FiM. The song was adapted by the show's composer, Daniel Ingram. I about fell out of my chair when I saw this! Not since I encountered the first semi-obscure Shakespeare reference in an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 have I been so tickled. The song above is derived from "Putting it Together," from Sondheim's Pulitzer Prize winning musical, Sunday in the Park with George (one of my two favorite musicals, along with West Side Story). I love the tribute, and wonder what Mr. Sondheim thinks about all this.



Here's the original song (above) included in this scene from Sunday in the Park with George, featuring Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters. The comments section on YouTube already has quips from bronies who've just discovered this; and yes, that is Brent Spiner in a portion of the scene.



And if you're interested, here's the complete episode of MLP: FiM (above) that contains the parody song. Enjoy! As Rainbow Dash would say, inclusion of Sondheim references instantly makes this show 20% cooler!

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P.S. Bonus video below! There are pony mashups, of course. This is the first thing I ever saw the ponies in, even before I caught up with the episodes of the show. It's a mashup of the trailer for The Dark Knight with images from MLP: FiM. And it ... is ... AWESOME!!!

The Dark Knight Rises Teaser Trailer!

Is anyone else excited? I'm excited! I will probably explode from excitement before the year is out, but, yeah! I'm excited!

Seriously, I haven't looked forward to a movie this much since the days of the original Star Wars trilogy. And I expect Chris Nolan's flick to be much better than any of those! I've loved every movie I've seen by Nolan, particularly The Dark Knight and Inception.

The Dark Knight Rises Teaser Trailer at YouTube

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Siberian Siblings at Cedar Cove

THIS VIDEO IS AWESOME! It comes from Cedar Cove, the park where I used to volunteer. Gunny and Sierra are littermates, and I love them both. Sierra especially was my sweetie during my days at the park! It is so awesome to work with these cats. Tigers are the most amazing and beautiful animals I have ever seen. I really miss them.

Look at how big those two tigers are in the video, and then check out how they looked when they were itty bitty little kitties! This picture was taken by Cedar Cove's founder, William Pottorff, who raised these cats himself. That's Sierra on the left looking up, while her brother Gunny figures he'd better get some eatin' done before his sister takes the rest!



Cedar Cove Feline Conservatory & Education Center

My animal pix at SmugMug, featuring thousands of pictures of Cedar Cove's cats!

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"We Used to Wait" by The Arcade Fire

This creative video of the song "We Used to Wait" by The Arcade Fire is awesome, but the song itself is even awesomer! (Is "awesomer" a word? I declare it to be a word.) At the official website of the video, you can apparently (using Google Chrome) interact in some ways with the video -- I haven't tried that yet. Watch the video regardless, and use full screen and as high a resolution as you can -- there are a lot of little things going on here. And if you don't yet have the latest CD called The Suburbs by The Arcade Fire, get it now!

Arcade Fire - We Used To Wait (The Wilderness Downtown full experiment - HD 1080p) (YouTube)

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h/t Joe Jervis

Dmitri Hvorostovsky - Largo al factotum

I found this terrific video of Dmitri Hvorostovsky singing "Largo al factotum" from Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville) this past week. I looked it up for my friend Danny, who couldn't recall having heard this before -- but he recognized it when he heard this! Hvorostovsky is great in this performance, and the video has fabulous sound as well. Enjoy!

Dmitri Hvorostovsky - Largo al factotum (Japan 2005) HD (YouTube)

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I'm in Ravenclaw House Myself...

Congrats to my best friend for a gajillion years Claudia White, flute-player extraordinaire, who landed an awesome gig tonight playing for a whole host of celebrities and guests as part of an orchestra at the grand opening of the new Harry Potter theme park at Universal Studios in Orlando. I understand author J.K. Rowling will be there along with the stars of the Harry Potter films, and the orchestra Claudia is playing in will be conducted by none other than John Williams! Woo!

The degree of separation between me and John Williams has now been reduced to one. This is exciting! I was a John Williams fan before anyone knew who he was. Seriously, do you know anyone who actually owned (I may still have it somewhere) the original soundtrack recording of The Towering Inferno? On LP?!? I credit Williams’ lush scores with introducing me to the world of great orchestral music, laying the groundwork for my later interest in classical music. A favorite JW score? Too many to mention, and he has had his ups and downs. But who of my generation can forget that day when we first sat down to watch some brand new space adventure flick called Star Wars, and Williams’ iconic theme tore out of the speakers and into our ears for the first time? You knew in two seconds this was going to be the best adventure of you life ‘til then. Currently, I’d have to rank JW’s score to Catch Me If You Can as one of his finest, mostly because the jazzy riffs were totally unexpected. One of my most enduring favorites by him has to be his score to Empire of the Sun, a very underrated classic from Steven Spielberg that introduced us to some kid named Christian Bale – wonder whatever became of him?

And J.K. Rowling herself? Don’t get me started. This is the woman who took fantastic tales that most people regard as children’s stories and made them respectable for everyone to read. Outside of the pleasures of the Harry Potter series itself, would we have Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book or China Miéville’s Un Lun Dun without HP’s success? The best writers have long known that if you want to write inventive stories with memorable characters, you write for young people – or the young-at-heart.

Anyway, congratulations once again to Claudia White, who has put up with more of my insanity than any reasonable person should. I toast thee with Maker's Mark!

Incidentally, there's a live web feed available here tonight and Friday morning.

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The Gay McDonald's Ad!

This spot is absolutely charming! The ad has gone viral, and is receiving much praise:

"It's very encouraging for gay youth to see themselves reflected in such mainstream media," said Helen Kennedy, executive director of EGALE Canada. "It's great that McDonald's is putting it out there, and kudos to the creative team. It's certainly a step in the right direction."

As you might expect, the wingnuts are having fits. Follow this link and see what Joe Jervis's commenters think about that nonsense.

What I and many other gays want to know is, when do we see an ad like this here in the U.S.? I'll accept no less than the day when that happens.

Gay McDonald's ad in France (YouTube)

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P.S. Who's up for an Angus Burger?

UPDATE: Well, THIS certainly is a rotten turn of events. Who's up for Burger King?

"Bevo al Tuo Fresco Sorriso," from Puccini's La Rondine

This is quite simply one of the most beautiful things I have ever heard in my life, featuring the incomparable Renée Fleming and the marvelous (and terribly, terribly cute) Jonas Kaufmann. Crank it up, people!

"Bevo al Tuo Fresco Sorriso," from Puccini's La Rondine.

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P.S. This is the concluding track on Renée Fleming's latest CD, Verismo. It's all about love!

Furries Sing & Furries Dance!

Oooooo, looky! Furries singing and dancing in a music video! I've never heard of this band but I guess they like furries. Now if I can just find an opera production using furries. Don Giovanni as an anthrowolf? Tosca with Baron Scarpia as a weasel? Anything with Renée Fleming as a gorgeous vixen?


Speaking of vixens, let's not forget the one genuine furry opera, Leoš Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen!

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P.S. I just found this page with some very cool furry art done for a production of The Cunning Little Vixen in New Zealand. Enjoy!



UPDATE: Some furry reax to the video here, including words from a couple of the fursuiters in the video! Yay!

Valery Gergiev: The Maestro of Petersburg

For my money, Valery Gergiev is the best living conductor, period. This video shows him performing Stravinsky's Firebird with the New York Philharmonic. I have Gergiev's recording of the complete ballet Firebird with the Kirov Orchestra, and it is AWESOME! And I've watched his Metropolitan Opera DVD of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin so many times, I'm likely to wear the darned thing out. Gergiev has a very muscular style of conducting, which makes his tender moments all the more heartbreaking. Although it's a hoary cliché, his conducting feels very "Russian," and from what the critics and fans say, that's an apt description of Gergiev's art.

Watch the video to the end and see how long he holds the final note of the Firebird. Wind players, take a deep breath!

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Kids Talking About Evolution

This is just far too cute to actually be scientific...and yet it is!

Plainly these children have either great schools or great parents, or both.

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Logorama

Logorama from Marc Altshuler - Human Music on Vimeo.

Finally! The way, WAY cool winner of the 2009 Oscar for Best Animated Short Film. Click and be amazed!

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Fasten Your Seat Belts!

Currently I'm working on my story (mentioned before) that was inspired by Daisy Mora and her unique way of getting to school (I'm ratcheting up the danger quotient quite a bit, though -- it is a story, after all). I'm trying to dig up as much information about this as I can, to better fill in the world I've created in my story. And guess what I found today? Video, my friends, of Daisy Mora and her siblings going to school.



OMFG!!!

In this video they describe exactly what the equipment that the kids use is like. It's cruder than I thought. But it's amazing the resourcefulness and simple courage people have when faced with situations like the one facing these people and where they live.

I...am...in...awe.

Hang on to something before you start this video, and enjoy! If you dare...

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Vegeterrible

Via Drawn!, here's Vegeterrible, a cute short animated film about one bad avocado! The short was made by Danish animators Henril Sonniksen and Benjamin Neilsen. The description of the film from Vimeo:

A swinging Mexican fiesta goes bad when a very hungry rotten avocado crashes the party and starts devouring the guests... Vegeterrible is a film about the last tomato's fight for survival.

Vegeterrible from Henrik Sønniksen on Vimeo.

Enjoy!

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Awesome Flight 1549 3D Animation

We all remember how the supercool Capt. Sully skillfully ditched that plane in the Hudson River after the double bird strike that destroyed both engines on his aircraft. Everyone survived; not even a broken limb! Capt. Sully was last off the plane, walking through the aircraft twice to make sure everyone had gotten off safely. Now this totally awesome video recreates the event in 3D animation (best viewed full screen). You're all but on this aircraft, from takeoff to ditching. Cockpit-to-ground transmissions are included. Fantastic stuff! See more at the website of the people who made the video, ExoSphere 3D. And here's to all of your future flights being piloted by a Capt. Sully!

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h/t: James Fallows of The Atlantic

P.S. If you have trouble with the embed above, watch it at YouTube.

Alma, a Short Film by Rodrigo Blaas

Alma is an award-winning short animated film made by Rodrigo Blaas, an animator for Pixar who made this film on his own. The short is beautiful, charming, spooky, and has an ending right out of The Twilight Zone. It's only five minutes long, so go check it out!

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