Author: DOuG pRATt

Norman Rockwell’s Vision of My Future

In 1965/66, Norman Rockwell envisioned the girlfriend I would have ten years later, right down to the drawing pad and jeans with boots. Except for her height. Marion was almost 5’10” tall. Few girls could pull off this classic “gorgeous college art student” look so beautifully.

Picasso vs. Sargent, by Norman Rockwell, 1966

As with other Rockwell paintings, Picasso vs. Sargent has a humorous idea behind it, like a single-panel gag cartoon. Here is a critique by someone who has put a lot more thought into the painting’s gag than I have.

https://massmedievalist.substack.com/p/the-massachusetts-medievalist-on-23d

The Muggles

Beatles mugs, a Christmas present from my big sister.

When she was here in August to help me during a very tough week of cancer treatment, she was amazed to see this photo that I came across purely by chance online. My sister confirmed that it does indeed show her at the legendary Beatles concert at Shea Stadium in 1965.

One of My Good Questions

Brent Butterworth, whose audio reviews I first read probably 35 years ago, answers a question I submitted to Audio Unleashed, his podcast with Dennis Burger.

Brent is wearing Audio-Technica ATH-M20x headphones. The same ones worn by Jon Stewart on his podcast, as I have pointed out.

For $50 the ATH-M20x has excellent sound quality, but the earpads are the most uncomfortable of any headphones I’ve ever owned. Brent must agree, because he did what I did and replaced the pads.

Dennis is wearing AKG K371 headphones. I also have a pair of those. (Uh… what did I say in the previous post? Something about wanting to have fewer physical possessions?)

Audio-Technica ATH-M20x
AKG K371

Tape Heads

Bismo and I were rhapsodizing last week about recording Star Trek as kids, by holding tape recorder mics up to TV speakers. My tape recorder was an Aiwa TP-32, a Christmas gift from my parents when I was ten years old. I soon leveraged my mastery of the prized possession into an audio-visual aide gig at school.

The TP-32 in that video is slightly different from the one I had, which looked like this.

Every so often I check eBay to see if there’s a TP-32 worth buying. Sometimes I see one, but in keeping with my goal of having fewer physical possessions, I never bid.

Singing Boston’s Praises

When I saw The Who at Fenway Park five years ago, Roger Daltry thanked Massachusetts General Hospital and a Boston doctor for restoring his singing voice.

Dr. Steven Zeitells had developed groundbreaking restorative laryngeal techniques, and operated on Roger just before our 2010 Super Bowl appearance. He was here in the audience tonight, somewhere, and without question would have been pleased by this stadium-full of happy fans. “He saved my voice.”

https://www.thewho.com/backstage-blog/moving-on-tour-fenway-park-boston-ma-september-13-2019/

Julie Andrews famously, and tragically, lost her singing voice in 1997 from a botched vocal cord procedure at New York’s Mount Sinai Medical Center. Julie later came to Boston and met with the same specialist that Roger Daltry saw.

https://www.massgeneral.org/surgery/voice-center/about

Julie’s familiarity with Boston goes back a long time. Fifty-three years ago, she made this reference to Filene’s Basement that was lost on Dick Cavett.