My Freemasonic Yowl

now with <10% syncopation

My kid had the flu this week. Baby girl got knocked out. Do you remember having the flu as a kid? It’s the stuff of nightmares.

That said, when she is sick, everything slows down, leaving ample time to read and think and play piano. 

And so it was that I had plenty of time to obsess this week. And as the Sabbath of my people dawns, I will stop here to reflect on two of them….

Patrick vs. the Snarky Polish Lady

On Saturday night I indulged in one of my favorite pastimes, which so happens to be one of my few tangible skills. I bellied up to a bar and drank beer with a pal. And when we were well into this sacred act, two pizzas–one Marinara, one Margherita were delivered to the bar from the pizza parlor next door.

Margherita of Savoy. She married her first cousin and birthed Victor Emmanuel III, who was a real turd.

And people, these looked like the Platonic ideal of pizza pie. My pal Patrick and I were both duly impressed. And jealous. “Thou shalt not covet thy bartender’s pizza”, said no one ever. So covet we did. 

Platonic ideals demand commentary. Who are Patrick and I not to remark on remarkable things? 

Patrick remarked that the pizza Marinara is the litmus test for the quality of a pizza place, to which the snarky Polish lady* next to us piped in, positing that Patrick was being preposterous. To her, you can’t judge a pizza joint without trying their cheese and, as such, the Margherita is the true test. 

Patrick and the Polish lady duked this one out**. They were firmly committed to their respective positions, offering little sign of negotiation or compromise. The whole bar got into it. It was the most fun I had all week. 

And it got me thinking…

I’ve been really interested this week in low-stakes, high-energy debates. Is a hot dog a sandwich? Who is the GOAT of ____? Stones or Beatles? Best tacos in town? Kill, Marry, Screw? Pasta, potatoes, rice, or bread.***

I think these semi-self-serious playful debates provide the perfect playground in our polarized times. This week, I convinced myself that in our times it is critically important to have fun, friendly, low stakes debates. 

Hit me up if you wanna have a knock-down, drag-out fight about nothing whatsoever.

Turns Out My Barbaric YAWP is a Jewish-Freemasonic Yowl

This week I was also called out of class to evaluate the Berlin state exams for tenth-graders. The students give presentations on topics of their choosing. Some of these presentations are banal, others are enriching. One team was exploring how Nazis repudiated jazz music, then appropriated and sought to regulate it. They shared a primary source that I could not stop thinking about this week. 

Josef Skvorecky was a Czech national who was a slave laborer in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia during WWII. He later became a celebrated writer, recalling a set of rules and regulations issued by a Nazi Gauleiter (Gauleiter were the regional officials for the Third Reich) that were imposed on all orchestras during the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia.

1. Pieces in foxtrot rhythm (so-called swing) are not to exceed 20% of the repertoires of light orchestras and dance bands;

2. In this so-called jazz type repertoire, preference is to be given to compositions in a major key and to lyrics expressing joy in life rather than Jewishly gloomy lyrics;

3. As to tempo, preference is also to be given to brisk compositions over slow ones so-called blues); however, the pace must not exceed a certain degree of allegro, commensurate with the Aryan sense of discipline and moderation. On no account will Negroid excesses in tempo (so-called hot jazz) or in solo performances (so-called breaks) be tolerated;

4. So-called jazz compositions may contain at most 10% syncopation; the remainder must consist of a natural legato movement devoid of the hysterical rhythmic reverses characteristic of the barbarian races and conductive to dark instincts alien to the German people (so-called riffs);

5. Strictly prohibited is the use of instruments alien to the German spirit (so-called cowbells, flexatone, brushes, etc.) as well as all mutes which turn the noble sound of wind and brass instruments into a Jewish-Freemasonic yowl (so-called wa-wa, hat, etc.);

6. Also prohibited are so-called drum breaks longer than half a bar in four-quarter beat (except in stylized military marches);

7. The double bass must be played solely with the bow in so-called jazz compositions;

8. Plucking of the strings is prohibited, since it is damaging to the instrument and detrimental to Aryan musicality; if a so-called pizzicato effect is absolutely desirable for the character of the composition, strict care must be taken lest the string be allowed to patter on the sordine, which is henceforth forbidden;

9. Musicians are likewise forbidden to make vocal improvisations (so-called scat);

10. All light orchestras and dance bands are advised to restrict the use of saxophones of all keys and to substitute for them the violin-cello, the viola or possibly a suitable folk instrument.

These regulations are adjacent to a whole rant I have about dangerous misconceptions of planning, order, and clarity of vision in authoritarian and totalitarian regimes. But I gotta run to class.**** 

The short of it is this: 

Despite everything you have been told, authoritarian regimes, even the most “effective” of them are rarely well-organized machines; they are lawless, messy, wayward, pharisaical, and senseless. Authoritarian regimes do not bring order. They destroy order. 

There. Done. Now I’m late for class. Whatevs. 

-DL

*Snarky in the best sense of the word. But still, her snark filled the bar. What I’m saying is, she was as cool as super snarky Polish ladies get.  

**While I never have nor would I ever think to order a pizza without cheese, Patrick soundly defeated the Polish lady. Even her friends, who began the debate firmly on her side, came to agree with my boy. How about them apples?

***Rice, being woefully inferior to the others, should not even be in this debate. 

****Instead of writing this newsletter near the end of my Friday, I will henceforth peck away at this thing during the 45 minute break I have in the morning. I am now committed to running or biking in the Grunewald Forest Friday afternoons between classes. Join me if you like!

I’m learning how rituals that mark time matter to me. So this year, I am carving out an hour or so on Friday to sit quietly before my family wakes to write about what I obsessed about that week. If you enjoy this weekly reflection, please subscribe so I can send it to you every Friday.