GCD February Social

February 2021 GCD Social

From the Caller’s Perspective

Joanne Reiner Wilkinson shared her "Decisions, Decisions: The Elusive Art of Writing a Dance Program".

Choice Morsels

All carillon playings, programs, events are posted on Facebook (for First United Methodist Church of Germantown only). We present a summer recital series during the month of July with professional carillonneurs from around the world. Monday evenings at 7:30. The church is at 6001 Germantown Ave, we listen from the garden of Wyck (historic house) at 6026 Germantown Ave or elsewhere in the neighborhood. Freewill donation.

YouTube people to explore: Geert D'hollander (Bok Tower Gardens FL), Boudewijn Zwart, Frank Steijns

Beware of carillon imitations with speakers and automatic players which have no dynamic control. Instruments with less than 23 bells (2 octaves) are called chimes. Swinging bells in England (and some in North America) are "change ringing."

Farewell Song

Jane McCarty & Michael Bell sang a song in honor of a news story about hippopotami in Cali, Colombia. According to Michael the song was written "by Michael Flanders and Donald Swann, a British comedy review duo who performed from 1956 through 1967, initially in London but eventually in many places around the world (despite the fact that Michael Flanders had been crippled and used a wheelchair). I encountered the song on their LP record titled 'At the Drop of a Hat' which was released in 1960. They wrote and performed many songs about animals including the 'The Gnu' (in which they ingeniously pronounced a 'g' before every word beginning with 'n' as in the line 'the gnicest work of gnature in the zoo'). You can hear a recording of them performing the song at a performance in 1959 on youtube... In this performance, Donald Swann sings one of the choruses in Russian.

The Hippopatomus Song by Michael Flanders and Donald Swann

A bold hippopotamus was standing one day
On the bank of the cool Shalimar.
He gazed at the bottom, as it peacefully lay
By the light of the evening star.
Away on a hilltop sat combing her hair
A fair hippopotama maid.
That hippopotamus was no ignoramus
And sang her this sweet serenade:

Chorus: Mud, mud, glorious mud!
Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood!
So follow me follow
Down to the hollow
And there let us wallow in glorious mud!

The fair hippopotama he aimed to entice
From her seat on that hilltop above.
As she hadn’t got a ma to give her advice
Came tip-toeing down to her love.
Like thunder the forest re-echoed the sound
Of the song that they sang as they met.
His inamorata adjusted her garter
And lifted her voice in duet:

[Chorus]

Now more hippopotami began to convene
On the banks of that river so wide
I wonder now what-am-I to say of the scene
That ensued by the Shalimar side?
They dived all at once with an ear-splitting splosh,
Then rose to the surface again.
A regular army of hippopotami,
All singing this haunting refrain:

[chorus]

Breakout Rooms

Question #1: Tell us about anything unexpected that happened during the recent snowstorm.
Question #2: Tell us about something new that you have learned or tried.

Room names:

Social time after the program

There was a discussion of games and movies, and we were asked to share favorites mentioned.
Games: