M&M And Beethoven

Chocolate!?!?!
Plain or Peanut!?!?!
Give me some....

What does Beethoven have to do with M&Ms?
     Nothing.
Did he like chocolate?
     I don't know, but he liked coffee. 60 coffee beans were brewed for his morning coffee. Daily.
     (True story.)

So what about the M&Ms?

Read on....

~*~

Um, no.
Not M&Ms.

Eminem.

Huh?

Eminem.

Oh, you mean that white rapper dude from Detroit who says awful things in his raps?

Yes.

~*~

It is probably hard to imagine my writing here about a rapper, much less the rapper Eminem.

It is probably even more difficult to imagine my connecting this rapper with such a phenomenal composer as Ludwig von Beethoven.

I do understand for when the connection occurred to me, I could not imagine it.

Let me explain.

Beethoven was known for carrying around a sketchbook in which he would write down musical ideas that struck him during the day so that he could remember them and perhaps use them in compositions.

Who knew that Eminem also keeps a sketchbook, of sorts?

During an interview on the TV show 60 Minutes with Anderson Cooper, Eminem showed Anderson a box filled with scraps, notebooks, and pads of paper.  On each scrap was some idea, word, phrase, etc. that had struck Eminem as musical so he wrote it down.  He had yellow legal pads filled with ideas written in very random positions on the page.

Eminem calls his box of ideas "Stacking Ammo" for future songs.

Anderson commented that someone looking at these would think the person writing them would belong in a mental institution.

I believe any outsider looking at the creative process of a musician would consider that person fit for the asylum for often chaos reigns until order is in place.

I have been known to make notes like these.
No, I am not presumptuous enough to consider myself on either of these men's level.

For example: I have been known to write down the rhythms that the fireworks made during a 4th of July celebration.  Those rhythms were then incorporated into an activity with Handel's Music for Royal Fireworks.

[My brother, who walked all the way back to the car to get me some paper and something to write with, aided me in this endeavor. He probably doesn't remember it.]

Making connections is often intriguing and amusing and informative.

Please, excuse me.

I just thought of something.

I need to go write it down.

In my sketchbook.