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Historical - Blog Posts
The Twin-City Daily Sentinel, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, March 11, 1912
Queer Composers
For Pride Month, I would like to share a list of some of my favorite queer composers. Being queer doesn’t matter when talking about the music, and there is no other commonality that pairs these composers together. The point isn’t to say that queerness makes their music more valuable or influences their music, rather the point is to recognize diversity, and to acknowledge queer visibility. I understand the people who scratch their heads or roll their eyes at the idea of bringing up queer composers, and to them I say the point is simply to recognize their existence, because prejudices and biases through time have worked on erasing or revising history in order to keep hidden this aspect of the human condition. You could shrug and say “Who cares if Tchaikovsky was gay?” and I would say, “You’re right, it doesn’t matter much outside of biographies, but if you acknowledged Tchaikovsky’s homosexuality in Russia you could be arrested for “promoting gay propaganda”. I am also motivated by a comment from a friend who admitted they think the concept of “Pride” for anything you cannot control is “idiotic”. My response can be summed up as, when a group has been shamed for years for their identity, they will be ready to sing about it from the mountaintops when it is accepted. In other words, it is not about who is better or worse, rather it is the opposite of shame, and hopefully putting a human face on something that a lot of people only consider in the abstract.
In no particular order, here is some cool music by some queer people;
Tchaikovsky: Possibly the greatest composer in Russian history, and one of the greatest composers in general. Pyotr Illych Tchaikovsky wrote in multiple genre, from symphonies to concertos to ballets, chamber music, opera…and while he can be criticized for the way he develops themes, his music is melodic and passionate and brimming with life. Among my favorites are his fourth symphony, the second piano concerto, the first orchestral suite, his piano trio, and his concert fantasy.
Poulenc: One of the members of Les Six, a group of Modernist French composers who were reacting against “overblown” Post-Romantic music, and methodical 12-tone serialism, Francis Poulenc can be described as a “neo-classicist”, sometimes his music resembles Stravinsky. The music tends to mix two unlikely moods: goofy, fun melodies and rhythms, and solemn religious contemplation. Cosmopolitan and Catholic, Poulenc was able to juxtapose opposite ends of the spectrum of the human condition; our vulgarity and profanity, and our spirituality and the desire for divine connection. My favorite works by him are his Organ Concerto, his harpsichord concerto “Concert-champêtre”, the concerto for two pianos, the cello sonata, and his Gloria.
Smyth: An English composer and an important figure in the Woman’s Suffrage movement, Ethel Smyth was a Post-Romantic who wrote powerful music lively with the British sense of nobility and strength. In the same ironic tragedy Beethoven went through, Smyth started to lose her hearing from 1913 onward, and so she gave up composing in favor of writing. While that is a shame, she left behind a good handful of orchestral and chamber music. My favorites by her are the overture to one of her operas, The Wreckers, her serenade which is kind of evocative of Brahms, and her gargantuan Mass in D Major.
Szymanowski: A Polish composer from the first half of the 20th century whose life can be seen as a narrative of seeking identity. Karol Szymanowski started out writing in the Post Romantic German style, with dense textures and a lot of chromatic modulation, but he was losing interest in this idiom quickly. He was inspired by Persian poetry he came across, and started writing in an Impressionistic way focusing on Mediterranean cultures, influenced by Greek and Roman mythology, Middle Eastern poetry, and the atmosphere of the Mediterranean as being a diverse mixing of cultures. Later in his life, he decided to look back at Poland for inspiration and finally found his “authentic” Polish identity in music inspired by the folk stories and Catholicism of Poland. My favorite works by him are his nocturne and tarantella for violin and piano, his song cycle the Love Songs of Hafiz, the third symphony, and his Stabat Mater.
Barber: It’s possible to say that Samuel Barber’s music is a good representative of American culture…a diverse mix of differences that complement each other. He took after jazz and blues, and after experiments in tonality heard in Europe and other American composers like Charles Ives, and he took after Romanticism with deep and powerful music. My favorite works by him are the Adagio for Strings which is heavily inspired by Mahler, his piano concerto, and Knoxville: Summer of 1915.
Copland: Another great portrait of America, Aaron Copland was considered one of the quintessential “American” composers of the 20th century, despite the combined factors of being gay, Jewish, leftist, and inspired by Russian and French modernism. All of those were seen as outsiders of the general American public. Even so, taking after Stravinsky, Copland’s music is full of spaciousness and open chords, melodies that range from longing to folksy and fun. My favorite works by him are his clarinet concerto, violin sonata, fanfare for the common man, and his ballet Appalachian Spring.
And if you reblog this list, feel free to add any of your favorite queer composers and share their music, their names, their faces.
‘In 1778, two Irish gentlewomen put on men’s clothing and ran away together. Lady Eleanor Butler had received several offers of marriage but was determined to share her life with her friend Sarah Ponsonby. […] They spent the rest of their lives in a black and white house called Plas Newydd outside Llangollen, cultivating their garden, improving their minds and filling the house with clocks, cabinets and “whirligigs of every shape and hue”. [They also had] a little dog called Sapho.’
need refs/inspo for period clothing?
here you go:
Medieval (9th-15th century):
10th century and earlier
Romance (1000-1250)
11th century
12th century
13th century
more 13th century
14th century
more 14th
15th century
and more 15th century
Gothic (1150-1550)
Renaissance (1520-1650)
16th & 17th century
16th century
more 16th
Tudors (1500-1550)
more Tudors
Elizabethan Period (1558-1603)
Jacobean Era (1603-1625)
17th century
more 17th century
and again
and even more
this won’t stop
Baroque (1600-1750)
Georgian Period (1714-1830):
18th century
more 18th century
18th century women’s fashion
18th century men’s fashion
Rococo (1720-1770)
Classicism (1770-1790)
children 18th-19th century
Regency Preiod (1811-1820)/ Empire (1800-1820s):
1790-1820s
more stuff on regency and georgian era
even more
that’s not enough regency
and more
how is there so much
early 19th century men’s wear
early 19th century women’s wear
Victorian Period (1837-1901):
Romantic Era (1820-1840s)
Civil War Era/1850-1860s
1870-1890s
more victorian
Edwardian Period (1901-1910):
1900-1910s
Belle Epoque (1880-1910s)
more edwardian/belle époque
Modern:
1910s-1920s [Fashion between the World Wars]
1920s
more roaring 20s
so much 20s
1920s hairstyles
1930s
1930-1940s
1930-1950s
1950s
more 50s
1960s
1960-1970s
1980s
lots of periods in one spot/fashion through centuries:
here, here, and here is almost everything (and properly ordered)
also here with lots of historic fashion magazines
100 years of beauty (includes lots of other cultures too!)
historic fashion
costumes of antiquity
more historical clothing
history of fashion
more history of fashion
“vintage” clothing
historic costumes
children’s historical fashion/toys
details
historic wedding dresses
historic assecoires (hats, shoes…)
hats
masks
parasols
lots of embroidery/jewlery
it indeed is western/european centric, I’m sorry for that, but for other cultures I simply don’t have so many references
ALSO note that most of the pictures show historical clothing from the upper classes or more festive clothing of the lower/working class because normal working clothes wouldn’t survive for such a long time, and the clothes were often re-used over and over again!
“We Wear Culture” is a collaboration between Google and more than 180 museums, schools, fashion institutions, and other organizations from all parts of the globe. It’s part of Google’s Arts & Culture platform, which is digitizing the world’s cultural treasures, and functions as a searchable guide to a collective archive of some 30,000 fashion pieces that puts “three millennia of fashion at your fingertips,” Google says.
But it isn’t just a database. Google has worked with curators to create more than 450 exhibits on different topics—say, how the cheongsam changed the way Chinese women dress—making the site an endlessly entertaining, educational portal filled with stunning imagery touching on everything from modern Japanese streetwear to the clothes worn at the court of Versailles.
i can already tell this has made writing for historical fandoms – the worst part of which, for me, is absofuckinglutely hands-down the clothing – much easier.
dude..... not cool... don't you know that babies are our future? leave them alone
Babies are NOT our future. They are our history. Babies were actually invented by John S. Baby back in 1732. Before that people actually gave birth to fully grown adults and it was k-wording all of the women (and some of the men too). Then John S. Baby came along and went “hey, maybe make them smaller” and he did. Sure, Mr. Baby k-worded a lot of people in the process, but it was for the greater good of humanity.
18th Century Manners
I love Regency Romance, don’t get me wrong, it’s one of my all-time favourite genres, but I really feel like there are not enough people who appreciate the non-romance shenanigans that the rigid code of politeness in force in Approximate-Regency-Period England allows. Where are the stories about:
1. Someone accidentally wanders into the wrong social group without realizing it, Certain Things are never openly discussed, ergo two discreetly gay dudes have been effectively members of a smuggling operation for like 4 years without anyone noticing the misunderstanding. A Discreet Communication Carried For A Friend is a Discreet Communication Carried For A Friend, after all.
2. Elderly matriarch of large and successful family is discovered on her death to be the widow of the wrong Sir Henry, at no point did anyone notice because It’s Rude To Pry, entire family has been slavishly obeying the whims of a completely unrelated stranger for 30 years purely because she turned up and announced that she was Eccentric Uncle Henry’s widow.
3. Trans dude makes his first foray out in male attire, meets a bunch of Lively Young Gentlemen while out drinking, they’re friends now, his entire made-up-on-the-spot backstory is accepted without question, nobody questions him for the next 50 years because he’s Lord So-and-so’s Dear Chum and therefore is just presumed to have been vetted at some point. Once or twice a Fellow Chum finds out, is mildly shocked, and then Never Speaks Of It Again Because One Does Not.
4. Being a werewolf is HELL when it takes 2-3 hours to get dressed to socially acceptable standards and all the best parties are on full moon nights so people can see to drive home.
5. Angry ex shows up to be poisonously sweet at a party, it is Literally Unthinkable to be so rude as to tell them to leave.
6. All your friends are 100% down to help each other cover up a scandal. So far your friends-group has concealed 1 lesbian affair, 2 het affairs, smuggling, extortion, and 2 murders.
7. Being an obnoxious old lady is super fun when everyone else is too polite to Sass You Back. You eventually find a stroppy young woman who drops even sicker burns than you do and adopt her as your heir.
Yknow what. I’m just gonna say it.
It’s about time we have a fictional princess who actually enjoys being a princess.
She enjoys the politics. She enjoys the diplomacy. And she enjoys the balls and banquets and attention and pretty dresses and that doesn’t make her a dumb shallow bimbo or some regressive anti feminist handmaid or whatever the kids say these days about women who don’t fall in line with their Strong Female Character power fantasies.
All the princesses urging for ‘something more’ that’s all fine and good but I’m ready to see a princess who appreciates that being a princess is already a lot!
Watching Malcom X (Denzel Washington)
!!!SPOILERS FOR MALCOM X!!!
Guys this movie is fucking haunting. Like yeah it's all historical and at the same time light hearted and funny BUT JEEZEUZ
Guys I can't stress enough how the scene where it's implies his dad is ran over by a train is scary and haunting. Like it was only a few seconds but damn.
Also I love how it portrays his mental state throughout his life without having to say it outright. Like I love the childhood flashback scenes and then cut to how he deals with it as an adult.
I just love this movie even if it makes me scared sometimes.
Day dress, 1860′s
From the Museo de la Moda via the Museo del Romanticismo on Twitter
some of my favorite vintage dresses ↳ black
the heart in my chest on wings by gaymess
When Cressida befriended Eloise Bridgerton, she had not prepared for the truly impressive number of lectures she would find herself subject to.