MUSIC MUSEUMS & MUSICIANS: from Amy Winehouse and the Albert Hall to Elvis, to Country, Classical, Handel and Pucchini

 Thomas R Machnitzki (thomas@machnitzki.com) - Own work

Graceland covered with snow. Memphis, Tennessee.

Music themed gate showing guitarist and musical notes. It is often worth going to a home to photograph it, even if you don't have the time and money to visit, or the location is closed. You might be impressed by the location, read and photograph a plaque outside about the famous person who lived there, or talk to other tourists about your mutual hero, or other places to visit in the vicinity connected with the famous person.

If you do get inside, however much you know about your favourite famous person, there is always more to learn.


The Jungle Room, Graceland, USA. Photo from Wik'pedia.

Here's a list of music museums for you and your family to visit. I have made it alphabetical and by country ro help you compile a bucket list for your travels.

The list is compiled by categories, including composers, singers, country, auditoriums and statues of singers and musicians. Some singers and songs are associated with landmarks (Blue skies over the white cliffs of Dover), or statues or graves or monuments of people best known as film stars or other categories. For example, Marilyn Monroe was known for much else besides singing Happy Birthday to President Kennedy in New York, and may be featured in waxworks museums, at Niagara and the Hollywood Heritage Museum.

The long, obscure word auditorium comes from the root words for ear and listening. Aural - related to the ear. (Oral is speaking as in oratory.) Audible means can be heard.

Statue of Stephen Foster removed because of objections to the banjo playing slave. Photo from Wikipedia. What a pity. I thought the happy banjo player was charming and the best part of the statue.

MUSIC CATEGORIES
1 Country and Western
2 Blues
3 Opera
4 Classical music
5 Folk
6 National
7 Ethnic

ETHNIC
National anthem and patriotic and classic composers.
National anthem lyricists.
Jewish
Amy Winehouse, Gershwin, Marilyn Monroe (converted for husband playwright Miller). See videos on Youtube of: Amy Winehouse and Yiddish songs such as Roumania.

Greece
Composer of the national anthem on a Greek island.



Sydney Opera House, Australia

AUSTRALIA
Sydney Opera House

FRANCE
Opera House, Paris

ITALY
Venona, open air opera
La Scala Opera House
Torre Del Lago, home of Puccini, statue outside.

Torre Del Lago, Italy, former home of Puccini, now a museum.

POLAND
Huge Chopin statue, landmark shown on tours of Warsaw.
Chopin House museum.

ROMANIA
See Youtube video of Yiddish drinking song Roumania by Aaron Lebedeff.

SWITZERLAND
Statue of Freddie Mercury in Montreux, and Museum devoted to him and his band, Queen.

Bernd Brägelmann - Bernd Brägelmann

Freddie Mercury Statue in Montreux, Switzerland. 

Amy Winehouse waxwork in Madame Tussaud's, London, England.

UK
Amy Winehouse in Madame Tussauds, Baker Street, London.
Amy Winehouse statue and trail and Jewish museum in Camden, London.
Handel museum in London.
Hendrix museum beside Handel Museum in London.
Handel's organ in Whitchurch Lane, Edgware, NW London, England.
Elgar Museum.

Handel and Hendrix museums on the upper floors of these two adjacent houses in London.

USA
Elvis, Graceland. Cars and guitars in many museums in the USA.
Hollywood Heritage Museum, Los Angeles.
Nashville (country music).
Dollywood.
Opryland.

FESTIVALS & MUSIC VENUES

UK
Royal Opera House Covent Garden
Sadlers Well
Festival Hall, South Bank Centre, London, England
Royal Albert Hall
Elgar Birthplace Museum

Elgar Birthplace Museum.

Elgar composed the music for Land of Hope and Glory which is played at Last night of the proms, in the Albert Hall in London, England.

EVENTS
New Year's Day concert broadcast from Vienna, Austria, on TV and radio in the UK.

Useful Websites
https://www.facebook.com/ScottishOpera
https://www.viennaconcerts.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giacomo_Puccini
https://handelhendrix.org/
https://www.dollywood.com/
Roumania Music only:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0agi_Gj2IEc

About the Author
Angela Lansbury is a travel writer and photographer, author and speaker, trainer specialising in public speaking and business English..

How To Find Toastmasters In Italy (and worldwide) and translate Italian (and other languages)

Problem
I'm probably going to Italy in the next year and would like to find some people who speak English and attend a social and networking meeting. Are there any Toastmasters clubs in big cities or near holiday destinations? Any point looking now, when I don't yet have a trip planned? (And the same goes for a couple of other countries.)

Yes, because :
1 SAVE TIME & MONEY
When I do plan to go to Italy or another country I shall be in a rush so researching the Toastmasters clubs several months in advance will come in handy. It's a rush at home to research when you are busy at the last minute booking hotels and travel tickets. It's a rush to research on the day when you should be catching a coach tour or co-ordinating meeting colleagues.

2 LANGUAGE PROBLEMS SOLVED
Last time in a hotel I found I had to pay for the three-day internet access to go onto a website in a hotel for three minutes to get a phone number. Finally, the websites assume you are Italian (or German in Switzerland) and send everything in a foreign language so you will wish you researched earlier at home in an English speaking country.

Looking at a website in English, one club has said it meets Giovedi. Help! I know hundreds of Italian words and can read whole pages of Italian and get the gist but I am suddenly stumped. I could be missing breakfast in a hotel trying to check all this before a 15 minutes free internet session times out. Giovedi is Thursday.

I have also learned or been reminded about placenames: that the Italian for Florence is Firenze. Milan is Milano. Rome is Roma. Genova is Genoa. I have noticed some abbreviations. RM is Rome. MI is Milan. TO is Torino. GE is Genova. VI is Vicenza. CO is Como. FI is Florence.

Veneto is not the city of Venice but a region of Northern Italy.

I have picked up some general vocabulary. Costa is not cost but coast. Di is of.

I clicked on some placenames and up came Wikipedia in Italian. No sign of the English flag or the word English which you might see on the top of page one of a tourist site or hotel website or a blog or blog post created in Wordpress.

So I googled 'translate Wikipedia into English'. It said look on the sidebar (on the left of the screen). Nothing useful appeared in the first few lines.  I had almost given up when, at the end of the column, I found:

In altre linge (meaning in other language)
Deutsch
English (Hurray! We found it.)
Hrvatski (I looked that up. It's Croatian.)
Portuguese (It appeared with an accent too small for me to identify so I have given the English.)

2 TRIP PLANNING
It could help you re-route your trip before booking. Just looking at the website has already taught me some handy things, such as that there are four clubs in Milan - which would make it worthwhile staying overnight in Milan on a side trip from Switzerland (which I did to see opera at La Scala).

If I had told my family the days of the week when I could visit Toastmasters, and written to the clubs to find out if they were still meeting, I could have told my family that a Toastmasters meets in Milan on Thursday. Then we could have booked months in advance for expensive opera seats when they were still available at the cheaper price which we were willing to pay, for the in demand day, Friday.

Answer
Using the website Toastmasters International Find A Club I found twenty clubs in Italy. 20! If you are alone in Rome or nervous in Naples, go to a club which welcomes and helps potential speakers. (Do you have to give a speech at a wedding? Here's the place to go for help.) It's great entertainment. In Rome there's one every Tuesday.

How To Make Contact
No need to hunt for the right person in the club to contact. On the Toastmasters International website you just click on email.
That's the theory. Sometimes it works like a dream and if you've included your own phone number they ring back five minutes later!

However, I suggest you do this at least a week in advance, not on the day. You occasionally find a club where the person listed is away on business. Or the committee has just changed and they have not updated the website. You might find the club has closed for Xmas or summer holidays or forever.

If I don't get a reply from a club within 24 hours, I email another club in the area. I sometimes end up going there instead or in addition. You might even hear of a new club which is starting and not yet listed on websites.

I have listed the following in alphabetical order by city:

BOLOGNA
Toastmasters Two Towers, Bologna, BO, Italy. 6.30. One Monday our of three.

COMO
The Como Lakers, Como, CO, Italy. The first and third Thursday of each month at 7.30-9.30 pm.
Lake Como is a tourist destination in summer.

FLORENCE
1 Firenze Toastmasters, FL, Italy. On the second and fourth Thursday at 6.45 pm.
2 Toastmasters Academy, Florence, FI, Italy, 7.30pm -9pm Wednesday. I presume that's every Wednesday and not just one Wednesday a month but you'd better ring to be sure.
Florence, known for art and the bridge.

GENOA
Erzelli Toastmasters, Genova, GE, Italy. First and third Wednesdays from 6 to 8 pm.

MILAN
1 The Milliners, Milan, MI, Italy. Every other Monday at 7 pm.
2 Milan-Easy Toastmasters Club, second and fourth Tuesday at 6.45 pm.
3 Navigli District Toastmasters, Milano, Ml, Italy. 7.30 every other Monday.
4 The Xplorers, MI, Italy. 6.45 Every month, first and third Tuesdays.
MONZA
Next to Milan, 9 miles from city centre of Milan but the outskirts of the two cities are only three miles apart if you are driving. Speaking of driving, Monza is famous as the centre for Italy's Formula one.

NAPLES
Naples Toastmasters Club, Naples, NA, Italy. On the first and third Tuesdays at 6.30 pm.

ROME
1 Toastmasters INAIL, Roma, RM, Italy. 12.30-2.30, 1st and 3rd Wednesday.
2 SPQRs, Rome, RM, Italy. On Wednesday lunchtime, 12-1 pm. Sounds like a company club.
3 Toastmasters Roma, RM, Italy. 6.45 every Tuesday. Contact them through the website.

TURIN
1 Radiant Rhetoric, T o r i n o, on the 2nd and 4th Wednesday at 7.15 pm.
2 Toasting in the Sky, Torino.
3 Trucks and Tricks in Torino.
4 Toastmasters Torino, Giovedi (Thursday) first and third Thursdays at 7 pm.
It took me a while, plus a few searches, to find out that Torino is called Turin in English - and it's famous for the Turin shroud, reputed to show Jesus! Four Toastmasters clubs in a tourist destination.

VERONA
Toastmasters Monza, The Verona, San Massimio, (VR), Italy Milan-Easy Toastmasters Club.; Vicenza Toastmasters Club, Costabissara, VI, Italy, second and fourth Thursday.

Toastmasters in Italy and Worldwide
If you are already a Toastmaster (many clubs many members worldwide, you could start a club with the help of a new members' pack available free from head office if you can muster about twenty potential members from your company or just by advertising and getting everybody together at a restaurant or coffee bar. A good place to advertise is on MeetUp.

If you are on holiday or business anywhere in the world, you can join a Toastmasters club, attend a meeting, mentor a member by Skype, go to the annual contests for serious speeches in autumn and humorous speeches in Springtime.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, member of HOD and Harrovians in London, England and Braddell Heights Advanced club in Singapore. I am the winner of more than 50 ribbons for Best Speaker, Best Evaluator and Table Topic (impromptu speech). I won three ribbons in one evening this month at Harrovians. I have judged competitions and run workshops on public speaking and attended meeting in China, the Czech Republic, Singapore, Thailand and the UK and attended the world finals in Las Vegas, USA.

Speakers' contest at the Business School near Baker Street station in central London, England.

This post was compiled Feb 2018. Please bookmark this page but update on the Toastmasters website if you wish to attend a meeting. Share your favourite posts with friends. I have several more posts on Toastmasters on this website and on my Toastmasters blogs, and posts on Italy, St Valentine in Terni and waterfalls, and the Osteria Modigliani Restaurant in London, England. Also see my other websites: Luxury for less and luxury travel for less.

MUSIC! The Carnival March, Comic Operetta, Festivals, and all kinds of Music, Music!

Problem
What kind of music festival can I go to? Are you looking for a birthday or holiday event for a specific date, or just entertainment?

Answers

BY TYPE OF MUSIC

Tribute Acts

Obama Greek restaurant. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Carnival Parades

Christmas Carols
Events at churches in London and worldwide. Midnight Mass.

Classical
Lucerne Congress and Culture Centre, Lucerne, Switzerland, August 10 - September 8, 2018


.(Provisional dates. Check with booking agency.)

Comic Operetta

Grimsdyke Hotel Restaurant.

You can also stay in the hotel in a suite.

Country & Western
USA
Singapore has had a Country Music station on Saturday afternoons. It keeps disappearing I presume because of diminishing interest or people in charge wanting a change, then is brought back by popular demand.

Hymns and Sacred Music

Jazz

Opera
Verona. Outdoors in ancient arena. (Take warm wraps for shoulders and legs. The daytime is warm but nights even in high summer can be very chilly.)

Pop
Glastonbury is not taking place in 2018. The field and the organisers are having a Sabbatical.

Rock

MUSIC BY COUNTRY

Germany
Festivals and parades in Cologne and Mainz. Hear the traditional Mainz festival march on YouTUbe.

Italy
Verona - outdoor concerts in summer

Milan
Book online at La Scala opera house, Milan. We booked cheaper seats in a box at the top and side still very expensive, in my view. If you are a family and have the whole box, you can take turns sitting at the front and looking over. I was very disappointed. In the first half most of the time the singers were on one side of the stage below.

We had cheaper seats sitting at the back and we saw nothing. Why? Apparently boxes were designed like that so patrons could be behind curtains and secluded for a evening out with who knows who.

In the interval we complained. I would have wanted my money back. The box office said we should have told them earlier that we could not see. They moved us and put us down in the more expensive stall seats, in a back row, for the second half, which was much better.

Other music centres include Cannara.

I visited the house of the composer Puccini. A statue of him shows him smoking. He died of cancer.

Umbria, Italy, where the musical school has held open air concerts since 1843. Photo by Angela Lansbury, copyright. 

The Athaneum, Bucharest, where George Enescu first performed his orchestral Romanian Rhapsody.

Photo by Goldmund100 in Wikipedia.

www.festivalenescu.ro (Previous festivals in September)

Romania
We drove from the capital of Romania, Bucharest, to the second largest city, Brasov, to join a walking group. Near Sinai I saw a sign to the home of Romanian composer, George Enescu. It was late in the day and the place was closed but we and many other tourists gathered around the gate taking photos of the picturesque house in the woods. He designed this house himself, with the help of an architect.

George Enescu lived from 1881-1955. He taught Lord Yehudi Menuhin. Enescu was a composer and violinist. He travelled to the USA to perform, and lived in France. He is buried in Pere Lachaise cemetery, which has many dramatic graves of famous people and is a tourist attraction where devotees pay homage to their favourite artistes.

You can see a seated sculpture of him in Bucharest. Vienna has a wall plaque of his face on a bas relief on a house where he lived.

I wanted a musical souvenir of Roumania. I bought this music box which plays Rhapsodie Roumaine.

Switzerland
Festivals in Lucerne and Basel

Composers by Country
Poland - Chopin

UK -
London Beatles walking tour. You can walk across the zebra crossing which appeared on one of their covers.
Gilbert & Sullivan comic operetta (events at Grimsdyke Hotel, which was Gilbert's home).
Kenwood House, Hampstead.
Last Night of the Proms, Royal Albert Hall. Cheapest tickets are standing in the gallery.
Glyndbourne, opera, with strawberries and champagne picnics and deckchairs for hire.
Liverpool - statue of the Beatles
Many seasides have free concerts given around bandstands in parks in summer.
Musicals - look for two booths in London selling reduced price unsold or returned tickets on the day. You have to arrive early and queue up.
Tune your hire car radio to the BBC classical music stations. Or ask for a car which can play CDs and take your own discs with you to play on long journeys and in traffic jams.

You cannot get out your guitar and play it in a pub or restaurant unless they have a music license. The same goes for a Britain's Got Talent competition. I was in an event as a stand up comedy turn and we had to be moved out of the pub into a cricket club hall a week later because one of the turns was singing and the pub had no license.

Tribute Turns in Restaurants
Orama in Hatch End has regular tribute act evenings, very good value.
Greek restaurant
The Chinese Elvis performs regularly at a restaurant in Ruislip.

Wales
Cardiff Eisteddfod.


Welsh male voice choir performs at Writers Holiday in February in Fishguard, Wales.

The Welsh harp, performance with the Welsh male voice choir at Fishguard, Wales. Photo by Angela Lansbury, copyright.

The harpist showed me that the strings of the harp are coloured to help the player find the notes.

Welsh Male Voice Choir performing at Writers' Holiday, Fishguard. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

USA
All over America I saw items once owned by Elvis. A car in one museum, a suit in another, a guitar in another, a disc in another.
The great thing about America is that you are more likely to be able to hear country music on the airplane. You can do an Elvis tour.
Nashville.
Opryland. When I stayed at the Opryland hotel, I would go out in the morning, having had the radio off so I could sleep at night. I would come back and find the radio tuned to play Country music.
Graceland, home of Elvis.

YouTube
If you are looking for a national anthem or classic song, you are likely to find it on YouTube. I found several versions of the comic song about Romania. One was by Shirley Bassey. An even better one was by a Yiddish comic theatre group with a great tenor.

Several websites specialise in booking music events.
(I shall be adding more websites later. Come back tomorrow.)

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker,