How very, very, nice!

Chris -

When I say 'nice' I mean 'admirable' or 'done well'. When I say 'cool' I mean, weather-wise, 'less than hot but not chilly'; or, in the case of food, 'not as hot or warm as it should be'. When I say 'neat' I mean tidy and orderly' - or 'without ice'. I do not normally use teen idioms, nor any others, except, occasionally, in jest.

Many years ago I had a friend, Klaus Kratzenstein, from Germany, who would always say after a performance of mine that it was 'nice done, Chickson'. He could not pronounce 'Jackson' properly. A good fellow he was, a marvelous improviser in baroque or any other idiom. He is responsible for Houston's only Reger organ, that at St Vincent de Paul's, a marvelous instrument which does not receive the attention and use that it should - which is sad and not nice. He eventually moved back to Dusselforf and later died of cancer. His wife Mary-Lou de Wall-Kratzenstein is/was, also, a fine organist and scholar. The last I knew of her she was on the music faculty of one of our better universities in the great lakes area. I (and some of you may, as well) have her book, A Survey of Organ Literature and Editions, publish by the University of Iowa Press. It's nice.

About your work and that of some others here: it is a shame (and not nice) that certain other people get published by GIA and others, their horrid works vigourously marketed and widely performed, and we have such as what you and others on our forum have done remaining unknown and not in demand. Such a cool reception of our real talent is not nice, nor not, as some would say, 'cool', and definitely lacking in intellectual neatness.