board77

I thought Elizabeth Alexander's poem was fairly good. Her speech cadence was a bit annoying, but the poem was decent. (I prefer Maya Angelou, too, Eru.) Freddy doesn't like poetry either.

I liked the religious tradition aspect, but that's probably no surprise.

Who was the guy at the lunch wearing leaves? That is probably a stupid question, but I don't know. Is he a poet laureate? And if he's the poet laureate, why didn't he deliver the inaugural poem?


Lali

I'm a poetry lover, but I didn't love that poem.

Leaves?

There was a guy with a garland of leaves around his neck at the lunch afterwards. I was hoping someone knew who he was.


Lali

I was just posting at another site when something twigged in me that I had a Photobucket account!!!! 150 photos I thought I'd lost forever. This cheered me up no end, honestly.

I found both the invocation and the benediction to be overly long. However, I would assume that both men were given a specific time frame to use and they likely used every nano-second of it.

I dislike Rick Warren's style of preaching in general - this was the first time I have ever heard him speak and I wasn't really surprised. I am just very uncomfortable with the fundamentalist mind-set and his way of speaking reminds me of a televangelist. But that's his style. I didn't think his prayer was over the top, however, and it was inclusive as far as that goes. He did pray "in the name of Jesus" - however, I thought it was interesting (and prudent) that he made it a personal statement ("in the name of the one who changed my life") rather than a sweeping generality. He also acknowledged that we are a nation of many religions. But he did seem to go on and on.

I liked the old guy at the end...he started his benediction with words to a verse of "Lift Every Voice and Sing" a hymn which was written in the early 1900s and which is unofficially known as the "Negro National Anthem." It's a lesser-known verse, but very potent and certainly many of the older African-Americans recognized it.

God of our weary years,
God of our silent tears,
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who has by Thy might
Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee,
Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee;
Shadowed beneath Thy hand,
May we forever stand,
True to our God,
True to our native land.


(I have a special affection for old black preachers, anyway...and I love that hymn.)

Text of the invocation

Text of the benediction.

yes, racism is fine if it's from black preachers.

Here's a video of the incredibly fine performance by Yo-yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman, Anthony McGill and Gabriela Montero. It was hard to hear it properly on the live broadcast as the announcers didn't seem to understand that they should shut the &^#&% up already!

I loved the piece and I especially loved watching the musicians play it; Yo-Yo Ma in particular. (In addition to having an affection for old black preacher-men, I also have the hots for talented and sexy Asian guys... )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87liROpgVJY" target="_blank

I can't imagine how they played so well when you think about how cold their fingers must've been. Very very impressive.

Well, I did notice that the pianist had gloves (with the fingers exposed, but still....)

There was an interesting article about how both Perlman and Ma might use these special carbon instruments, designed specifically to withstand playing outdoors in cold weather. However it looks like they used their traditional (and uber-expensive) wooden ones.

Here's the article.

I noticed that the clarinet had an unusual barrel piece and the bell looked a bit different, too. I had never heard of him before; I am going to try to download some of his music.

Apparently this is the first time a classical quartet has been invited to play at the inauguration. I suppose, before the age of sound enhancement, it would have been impossible...and brass bands were obviously traditional.

It was one of my favorite things about the ceremony. That, and Aretha's hat.

Earlier, I asked if this was the first time the Chief Justice screwed up the oath: apparently the answer is "no".

The Ottawa Citizen wrote:

"Lots of people have flubbed the oath, perhaps most memorably Chief Justice (William Howard) Taft, who sort of riffed and then made up his own" upon swearing in then-president Herbert Hoover, said Mr. Rosen.

Where the oath calls for the president to pledge to "preserve, protect, and defend" the constitution, Mr. Taft said "preserve, maintain and defend" -- injecting an entirely new word, while Justice Roberts merely got the order wrong.

Oh well - I think your country will survive this crisis just fine

I am sure Rick Warren had to submit his prayer several weeks ago for approval.


I think the bell of the clarinet might have been made out of coco boa wood. Very expensive duck calls are made out of this wood due to the resonance quality and since both operate on the vibration of a reed it would make sense to me. It also look similar to the calls I've seen.

d r

Feredir wrote:

I think the bell of the clarinet might have been made out of coco boa wood. Very expensive duck calls are made out of this wood due to the resonance quality and since both operate on the vibration of a reed it would make sense to me. It also look similar to the calls I've seen.

Wow...that is really cool, Freddy! I am going to investigate.

Aha! Looked it up. It's actually called "cocobolo" wood and the clarinet barrels go for about $250 . They are made by a company called Blackun. And they have the bells made out of the same wood. The bells are a mere $650.

A duck call. How funny is that? "Um, Mr. President, there seem to be some ducks lurking about..."

Coverage from around the world: Obama's speech was censored in China. Apparently, his references to communism were too much.


On a completely non-political note: I watched some clips from one of the balls, and I must say, seeing Michelle and Barack dance made me so happy. Not because they were so good , but because they looked so completely, amazingly in love. And that warms my heart.

That was beautiful. I'm very impressed they kept coordination in their fingers - mine go to hell very quickly when it's around freezing, never mind when it's BELOW freezing.

Watching them dance was really nice

Well, Ronald and Nancy Reagan were great dancers, too. And the Nancy always gazed adoringly at Ronnie.

So don't dwell on it, guys.

I knew that didn't look right when I typed it. That's about the going price for a duck call made of the same wood (no, I don't have one) but they sound awesome.

I don't know if Obama will need a duck call but he may be told to "duck" for an errant shoe . (please do not read anything into this and create a ruckus over how the Middle East will accept him, it's simply a play on words!)

freddy

Given that photo of Obama's shoes on the campaign trail, if he got any thrown at him he might just duck down and try them on for size.

In retrospect, in addition to his sober address to the nation what has struck me is how triumphalist it might have been and how much that mood was avoided. Sure the crowds were happy (and people acros the world) but Obama didn't set out to rouse them but instead set them to a hard and serious task.

I agree Tosh. That's actually one of the things that I liked best about his speech and what I like best about him. It would be very easy, in his position, to pander to a current feeling of joy. Though I'm quite sure he felt it, it was nice to realize that we now have a president who will actually do work.

I wonder, at the end of this term, how much vacation time he'll have taken compared to Bush

Estel wrote:

I agree Tosh. That's actually one of the things that I liked best about his speech and what I like best about him. It would be very easy, in his position, to pander to a current feeling of joy. Though I'm quite sure he felt it, it was nice to realize that we now have a president who will actually do work.

I wonder, at the end of this term, how much vacation time he'll have taken compared to Bush

So, Bush not only ruined everything about the country... but he didn't actually do any work.