Word: glissando
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Slithery Glissando. The Mixturtrau-tonium, originally developed by a German physics professor in 1930 and later refined by Engineer-Composer Oskar Sala. is a complicated monster operated by pressing the fingers on two strings through which runs a weak electric current. By shifting his fingers along the strings much like a violinist and by working switches and pedals, the player can-at least theoretically-produce notes and pre-set chords of every imaginable color, frequency and strength. But so far the Mixturtrautonium can be played only by Engineer Sala...
...unwilling to "speak of his own emotional life: to exhibit naked feeling appeared as a breach of etiquette." Mild-mannered Cyclopedist Blom, 66, also sharpened up his donnish ax on the Queen's English and "made war" on certain usages that irked him. Among the casualties: GLISSANDO, which Blom calls a "mock-turtle with a French head and an Italian tail . . . unfortunately used by composers anywhere but in Italy," and TONE (used for "note" in twelve-tone music), which "has been accepted in America," says Grove V severely, "but must not be allowed to impose itself on the English...
...force to welcome Liberace to Madison Square Garden. While boxing fans withdrew trembling to the shelter of their favorite saloons, a near-capacity crowd of 15,000 jammed the Garden; about 80% were women.* With a roll of drums, the crash of a gong, and a harp glissando, Liberace bounced onto the stage, wearing a snowy-white dress suit (later he changed into a gold lamé jacket...
...Millerism. Sinatra, now 36 and still a skinny 135 Ibs., thinks he knows just what happened since the early '405 when bobby-soxers were curling their toes at his boyish glissando. Says he: 'I was weaned on the best popular music ever written. When I was bumming around with Tommy Dorsey and Harry James it was all good. Guys like Mercer and Berlin and Hammerstein were writing their best. In those days a singer was just another guy, and the one-nighters, listening to the band by the hour-this is the experience a singer needs. You learned...