Reading, Writing, Arithmetic. And other random and sundry things such as sitting around cafes doing the aformentioned interests; climbing trees, riding bikes on golf courses at night; air hockey, tennis, chess, dodgeball, random prancks, swimming, general nonsense and silliness, et. al.
People to learn from; people to teach; people to share with; people to love.
Much of the stuff I listen to I do not consider music in the same way as the music I prefer, so I will start by listing the music that I'm into that really and truly is MUSIC, and then list the music.MUSIC: I've recently turned the tables toward Bach instead of Wagner, though Wagner is, of couse, a close second. Next up, in no particular order we have Beethoven (I order them 9, 5, 3, 6, 8, 2, 4, 1, 7) , Shostakovich (8th string quartet baby! Whatcha gonna do? and especially sym.s 5, 8, 7, 13, and the second movement of 10), Schubert (How do I love thee? Let me count the ways...damn, I can't count that high!) , Biber (if you haven't heard the Rosary Sonatas, stop reading now and go listen), Gorecki (his 3rd symphony might be the best work of the 20th century, easily of the last few decades; some of his choral music is great too, but stay away from his earlier wacky stuff), Penderecki (Credo and Polish Requiem rock my eastern European world!), Gesualdo (masses and his motets ain't bad either), Palestrina (quality masses through and through), Du Fay (thank you Greg) Verdi (predominately the Requiem--I don't care if you think it's cliche--and Don Carlo, which is strangely awesome) Mahler (Sym.s 2, 6, 8, 9, and Das Leid von der Erde), Part (most of it), Janacek (some fine fine quartets), R. Strauss (I fall more on the Solome and Elektra side of things), Bizet (not liking Carmen just isn't allowed), Chausson (not much output, but consistently good), Renee Flemming (...oh what I wouldn't give!), Jessye Norman, Rachmaninov (the 3rd is amongst the greatest pieces ever, and I love his 2nd suite for two pianos) , Mozart (slowly becoming more of a fan--I think that means I'm getting old!), Wagner deserves mentioning again (I mean, c'mon Tristan? Sheesh! and yes, Das Ring der Nibelungen is the best work of art every made by man--period!) Lopes-Graca, Mussorsky (but do I prefer the 69 or the 72 Boris Gudinov? I don't know), Benny Britten writes the occasional awesome piece (e.g. War Reguiem, 2nd Cello Concerto), Rostropovich is was and always will be better than Yo Yo Ma, no matter how cool the name Yo Yo sounds, Oh yeah, Veljo Tormis (a few of the sections of Forgotten Peoples are crazily fantastic, I sort of want to dance, but I have no idea how to dance to Ingranian folk music arranged for full choir), Brahms symphonies are very powerful, especially the 3rd, though his Requiem is the trembling crescendo of his genius; Mendelsson put out a lot of great stuff too (how unforgettable is that violin concerto! and the Reformations symphony is probably the best thing to come out of the Reformation), Bloch, who doesn't get enough credit, is always pleasant and sometimes (A Call in the Wilderness) terrifying, oh, and did I mention Wagner? And how 'bout Berlioz? That guy's a badass, eh?I must insert a sort of middle ground here between MUSIC and music, we will call it Music, designating that it deserves more credit than music and less than MUSIC, upon this ground stands...Music: Prince, Mingus, Coltrane, and perhaps a few others.music: Ani Difranco, Postal Service, Portishead, Johnny Cash, Cassandra Wilson, Dave Holland, Nina Simone, Radiohead, Skunk Anansie, Koop, Jay-Jay Johannson, Erykah Badu, Diggable Planets, Junior Brown, Merle Haggard, Bebel & Astrud Gilberto, Suba, Ojos de Brujo, Carla Bruni, George Jones, Patsy Cline, Esthero, Mindy Smith, Damian Rice, Dylan, Ray Lamontagne, Beth Orton, and lots of other stuff that I'll put on here later when this becomes less boring. Lately I have fallen in love with the "Pop en espanol" station.
My official position on movies is that I do not like them, and I do not generally respect cinematography as a legitimate artform, that said, I admit that there are some pretty awesome movies out there; some of them will be listed below.The best movie ever made was, of course, Purple Rain, followed by such movies as Das Boot, The Last Temptation of Christ, Gandhi, Gone with the Wind, Alexander Nevsky, Ivan the Terrible, Conan the Barbarian, The Neverending Story, The Big Lebowski, Apocalypse Now, Predator, Rambo: First Blood, other such films.
My official position on television is about the same as my position on movies, only more rigorous and with far fewer exceptions, so few in fact, that they are not worth mentioning; suffice it to say that I would rather television not exist. (but Nick has sort of got me on the X-Files lately...so shoot me, whatever).
I had a really long entry about books on here; but it vanished; if you know where it has gone, please let me know; if you know who took him, please report them to the proper authorities. I really don't want to write a big long entry again, so for now, we will have to content ourselves with a brief and temporary categorical list.Poetry: Pindar, Gower, Chaucer, Spenser, Sidney, Shakespeare, Milton, Donne, Whitman, Pound, Causely, A.D. Hope, Herbert, Huidobro, Goethe, Petrarch, Dante, Hopkins, Rilke, Fr. Ryan, Lovelace, Brooks, Holderlin, Hugo.Prose: Dostoevsky, Stendhal, Faulkner, Melville, Goethe, Tolkein, Hugo, Dumas. I used to like prose a lot, now I don't (but Hugo, Dostoevsky, and Faulkner are still amazingly badass).Philosophy: I'm not even going to get into this now; you can rest assured that if they teach it in school, I probably don't like it very much. Eric Voegelin; Bernard Lonergin.Theology: Well, of course, the Doctors of the Church, but more particularly; St. Augustine, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Tertullian, Justin Martyr, Meister Eckhart, Karl Rahner, Bernard Lonergan, St. John of the Cross, St. Ignatius de Loyola, Pope Benedict XVI, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Bonhoeffer, etc.And I read a lot of other stuff that I don't feel like getting into right now.And I don't hate everything modern, only everything stupid; and I cannot be blamed if those often overlap.
St. Augustine, Goethe, Schiller, Holderlin, Beethoven, Wagner, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Vincent de Sales, Pope John XXIII, Pople John Paul II, generally all of the Saints and martyrs, it is they who show us, concretly and in our finitude, the actualizied possibilites of a life lived glowing with the light, burning with the love, of Christ Jesus.