I love Mozart's Requiem, particularly this section

Which may be a little odd for a pagan, considering it is about the day of wrath, but hey, I was a mediaevalist in school, and my major professor sang the Dies Irae rather well. :)

I think the person who put this up has put up translations of all parts of the Requiem in his videos. There are also images from the Hubble Telescope to Pink Floyd and various others. I think I will subscribe to the channel.

One last thing regarding Officer Durman

Before going out to view the procession, during the actual service, I played Mozart's 'Requiem' at work (oddly enough, I happen to keep the CD there). Here is the Introitus and Kyrie:



Mozart's music is both haunting and uplifting, and reminds us that there is joy in death as well as sorrow.

Another attempt to apply medicine to history

What killed Mozart? Study suggests strep infection

The Annals of Internal Medicine has published a report linking Mozart's death with kidney disease brought on by a streptococcal infection. Although such attempts to practice medicine retroactively are fraught with uncertainty, I always find the attempts to diagnose symptoms from the descriptions left behind interesting. I'll have to look this one up.

Requiescat in pace

Today I found out that a co-worker, Nancy Charley, died sometime this morning or last night. She was up in Cincinnati on a work-related trip, and when she didn't arrive in the morning they checked at her hotel and she was dead. Just like that. She'd gone out to dinner with the others last night and seemed fine. It's just a reminder that death can come at any time.

I really liked and respected Nancy. She had a joie de vivre that I could barely dream of. I think she was in her 50s, and yet she did things like take belly dancing lessons, dance in the zombie-parade in downtown Lexington to Michael Jackson's 'Thriller', that sort of thing. She loved horses and volunteered at the Kentucky Horse Park. I really didn't know Nancy that well; she was an acquaintance, and yet I was always amazed by the spark of life that blazed within her. Now that spark is gone, and it makes me very sad, even though I know death is not really the end but is also a beginning.

I had been listening to Marc Broussard whilst working on a grant project before my boss told me about Nancy. I looked at the CDs I had at work and realised I had Mozart's Requiem mass. I don't know if Nancy was religious or not, but it seemed fitting, as it is now. So I'll include the 'Introit' and 'Kyrie' from his Requiem here. My condolences to her mother and other family. If the funeral is here and I'm not working, I'd like to go. I suspect she touched many lives in the time she had here. I gather she was somewhat of a wild child, especially in her youth. She also had a wonderful sense of humour. She was always supportive of me and valued my creativity. She will be sorely missed.