Western Shoot-out: The Virginian versus Bonanza

We watch DVDs and do not subscribe to cable. We enjoyed some television drama from the 21^st century such as Num3ers, Firefly, Bones (earlier years), Grey’s Anatomy (earliest years), and Sherlock, and sometimes we return to an episode or two. We also dig back into classic TV. Most classic television does not meet current standards for writing. Those were simpler times. 

Working our way through the first season of The Virginian, we also tried a Bonanza compilation. Although it is touted as centering on moral dilemmas, Bonanza is slow on the draw. To be fair, as a 90-minute show, The Virginian had the long-range advantage for plot development and characterization. The plain truth is that that actors—James Drury, Doug McClure, Gary Clarke, and even Lee J. Cobb—were comfortable riding horses while the boys from the Ponderosa seldom dismounted smoothly though mounting usually went better. Much of The Virginian was shot outdoors with riding and roping in wide vistas, though the close-ups are often stage sets. (I believe, also, that they used some kind of movie screen background with overlays to blend close-up action supposedly taking place in the wilds.) Almost all of Bonanza was shot on a sound stage. The cowboys in The Virginian wear chaps because they work hard. We seldom see the Cartwrights work at all.

According to Wikipedia, citing “Bonanza Television Show – ONE” at www.onlinenevada.org, Bonanza “is known for presenting pressing moral dilemmas.” But that is the essence of all fiction from the romanticist school. Almost all TV drama and popular fiction in general centers on conflicts of values. Technically, a dilemma is not just any choice, but a pair of undesirable alternatives. That was seldom the core of a Bonanza drama, but, in fact, often the case in The Virginian. Although everything usually works out well enough for the better folks, life on the frontier is uncompromising and unforgiving. 

PREVIOUSLY ON NECESSARY FACTS

Back in the Saddle Again 

Firefly: Fact and Value Aboard Serenity 

When Old Technologies Were New

Ma Kiley: Railroad Telegrapher 

The Success of the WEIRD People 

Music Makes You Braver

That is a tag line for the music of Two Steps from Hell founded by Thomas Bergersen and Nick Phoenix. When I was working as a clerk-typist (information specialist) for the Texas Military Department editing, distributing, and sometimes writing plans, procedures, and policies, I searched out music on YouTube to put in my headphones in order to keep out noise while I tried to concentrate. I found their album Battlecry. I signed up for the channel and bought access and then a download for that, Skyworld, Invincible, and Unleashed.

Katica Illényi delivered a full-bodied performance of Vittorio Monti’s “Csárdás.” (I find it acceptable that the best Hungarian dance would be written by an Italian.) It is just the first half of this YouTube video:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BF9uQI-SRv4
She also has a violin performance of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 a work usually scored for the piano. (At least, that was Liszt’s intent.)  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMU4SO7rp5w

 

Speaking of things Hungarian (such as my maternal grandparents), serving in uniform, I identified with this guy, whatever his mission was that day. 

“Ide Születtem” by Hungarica

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC53QRC-jjw

 

My brother’s band, Styrenes, recorded “Minstrel Boy” as a mock, but I liked the energy (and Paul’s brogue). 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0IgRq4AZXcg

I think that the Hans Zimmer version is the best modern instantiation. Written for Blackhawk Down, it goes well with a similar yarn, Battlestar Galactica. We were fans of the first three seasons, though Ron Moore’s post-modernist sense of life took the plot and theme  into entropy. Minstrel Boy/Battlestar Galactica

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdVN1P16L8o

 

The performance of “Men of Harlech” from Zulu is iconic. “Very good, mind ye, but they have no top tenors.” Of all the versions I listened to, Charlotte Church’s performance takes the prize.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZmrS_w6s7s

 

One May Day, I went looking for The Internationale and following links, I ended up at “Minka.” It was a song that we learned (in English) in grade school. Our neighborhood was very ethnic. When the teacher passed out the sheet music, one girl said, “Our dog’s name is Minka!” and another girl rejoined, somewhat saddened, “My mom’s name is Minka.” 

 

Minka with Ukrainian lyrics and English liner notes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYrGI0FncYc

A more modern theatrical rendition here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3EwoLkwq_o

 

Arturo Toscanini conducts The Internationale

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OPvWFDzDlA

Billy Bragg version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAw0Ri4FSdM

Oddly enough, in We the Living, Ayn Rand describes the song in positive words. What she hated about communism was communism. For her the October Revolution was a betrayal. She was all for modernism, globalism, and an end to nationalism and racism.

 

Also misunderstood, I believe, is our own national anthem, The Star Spangled Banner. We sing it as a dirge. It drags the hearse down the street and the carriage is a travois. It should sound like this: 

1814 Version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvVtFD9Na0I

It was set to a drinking song for a reason. We celebrate a victory. Drink to it!

“The Anacreontic Song” Soloist: Jacob Wright Conducted by Jerry Blackstone from the University of Michigan’s American Music Institute.  “The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus’s vine!” here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3l-n64NWHS4

 

When I was very young my heroes were cowboys, of course, and they were men on their own, not members of large groups. I liked Gene Autry. (“Whoopee-tie-aye-ay! I go my own way ... Where you sleep out every night and the only law is right.”) “Back in the Saddle Again.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt18gd6OSHk

 

“The Ballad of Paladin” here: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgvxu8QY01s

 

Being on your own is fine until it is not. Of the very many versions of “The Yellow Rose of Texas” I sent this one to Laurel. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izz0_qEl_-E

 

Previously on Necessary Facts 

Postmodernism 

After Action Report: Heartbreak Ridge 

Financing a Revolution 

Rebels: A Well-Regulated Militia 

 

Where the Only Law is Right

Back In The Saddle Again Recorded by Gene Autry Written by Ray Whitley and Gene Autry C               G7      C     I'm back in the saddle again F                       C      Out where a friend is a friend           F            Where the longhorn cattle feed        C            A7             On the lowly Jimson Weed D7                     G7                   I'm back in the saddle again C          G7         C       Riding the range once more F               C      Toting my old forty-four.           F   Where you sleep out every night           C           A7   And  the only law is right D7          G7      C      Back in the saddle again        F Whoopi-ty-aye-oh     C Rocking to and fro                    G7   Back in the saddle again  C      F               C  Whoopi-ty-aye-yay I go own my way  D7          G7      C   Back in the saddle again Chords for guitar from County Classic Song Lyrics.  [Lyrics edited - MEM]

ALSO ON NECESSARY FACTS

From Texas to the Moon with John Leonard Riddell

A Forensics Bibliography

Central Texas Bee Rescue

A Visitor from the CIA

Back in the Saddle Again