Daily Archives: January 19, 2022

Richard Tiegs| Special to the Iowa City Press-Citizen

The recent celebration of Martin Luther KingDay had me ruminating about freedom.

I dont normally think about freedom in music unless it is a patriotic song or freedom is used in the lyrics. After all, those of us writing music are too concerned about following the rules of good writing.

Looking back, I think my first real recognition of freedom in music came when I was in high school and commuting to play in the local university orchestra with my violin teacher, a cellist. We were doing a Hungarian dance.

The conductor used an interpretation that was different to me than how I read the music. I rarely have heard other orchestras do it the same way.

His study of the music allowed him the freedom to help us interpret it in a different way. This form of freedom is interpretive freedom of the black dots sprinkled across the page.

The next freedom I remember learning was called rubato. This word is derived from the Italian word for to rob.

To employ rubato in music means that one quickens and slows a tempo to be more expressive. In a love song, you might use rubato quickening to show ardor and rubato slowing to show tenderness.

It is this gentle quickening and slowing that give the piece its character. Rubato will drive a strict tempo person bonkers. But it is the director or performer using their freedom with tempi to make a statement.

Looking back, freedom came in another form that I didnt realize was a freedom. The fermata (you may call it a hold or the birds eye) is a freedom to be taken in music.

Just how long is musically good to hold something? Again, the performer/conductor has some freedom.

Hold it too short and the dramatic effect of the music may be lost. Hold it too long and you lose the audiences interest or you get an unintended effect of humor (like a Bugs Bunny cartoon).

A related freedom is the caesura (a short pause) and grand pause (a longer pause). A caesura is a cessation of sound to add emphasis to a statement. A grand pause is longerand used for more dramatic effect, like before the final Hallelujah in Handels so-named chorus.

Total silence and then the final resolution. The difference between fermata and caesura is sound or no sound. Silence is part of music, as my choir director reminded us about a recent selection.

As a conductor, I have the freedom to interpret music as my studies of the score may indicate. As a composer, I try to give hints at what was going on in my head as I jotted the notes down. As the performer, I try to take all the hints of the composer, the guidance of the director, and my knowledge and being to create a satisfying performance.

That is how I give my spirit the freedom to soar as I live a slave to the muse.

Richard Tiegs took a break from his practicing music for the Camelot pit orchestra to share his thoughts on freedom.

Continued here:

Yes, you can find freedom in music. Here's how. - Iowa City Press-Citizen

For two years now, weve seen Republicans cry My body, my choice in response to the stay-at-home orders and mask mandates put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic. A popular saying among the left, pro-choice crowd has become the new chant for the right, anti-masker agenda as if wearing a cloth over ones face is as invasive as a pregnancy.

As much as I hate to admit it, it makes sense that the political right has adopted such a saying. They claim to be, after all, the defenders of our first amendment rights defenders of our freedom of speech.

So why is it that a year since Donald Trumps presidency ended, and a year since the Jan. 6 insurrection, these supposed freedom of speech warriors are censoring themselves? Lets go Brandon is not as powerful or impactful of a phrase as they think it is. In fact, its a display of the constant irony within pro-Trump groups.

The phrase Lets go Brandon grew in popularity among right-wing circles because its a coded, clean version for F Joe Biden. The phrase started during an NBC interview with NASCAR driver Brandon Brown in October. Behind Brown and the reporter, the crowd chanted F Joe Biden, which the interviewer misheard as Lets go Brandon.

The slogan quickly took off within right-wing groups and became yet another catchphrase that Trump supporters like to stick to the bumper of their cars.

Republicans like to proclaim themselves as defenders of our first amendment rights. However, like any political party, they tend to be hypocritical from time to time. For example, When Twitter banned Trump a year ago, Republicans seethed at the idea that Big Tech was infringing upon the first amendment. At the same time, Republicans have been fierce advocates against trans people using their desired bathroom, which is just as much, if not more, of an infringement on first amendment rights.

Being freedom of speech warriors is only one of the many titles Republicans have given themselves over the years. They also used to claim to be the party that advocates for traditional familial values. However, with the rise of Republican superstars like Matt Gaetz and cheating adulterer Trump, these traditional values Republicans once highlighted during the Nixon and Reagan eras seem to be deteriorating.

And even though these traditional values are breaking down, it is apparently still too controversial to say f out loud. Ill admit, the f-word might be too strong of a word to use, I suppose it may corrupt the ears of little children around the country, after all. Oh no! For next time, it might be useful to invest in a thesaurus. There are quite literally thousands of different synonyms to replace the F in FJB.

Many Republicans claim that Democrats want to establish an Orwellian, 1984-esque communist regime. They claim their Democratic neighbors are communists, socialists and Marxists without ever fully grasping the difference between the three. There is no Big Brother waiting to smite you for going against the Democratic agenda. You will not be hunted down and slaughtered if you criticize the president or call him names. If there was a Big Brother who did these things, most people would have died a long time ago.

The reality is, I think there really is not much else to defend when it comes to our freedom of speech we already have it. With the exception of incitement, defamation and a few other kinds of speech that obviously should not be protected, most of what you say is protected under the first amendment. You could say the most heinous and disgusting things, but guess what? Hate speech is protected by the Constitution, and so is your right to cuss out the president.

So why not just say F Joe Biden? Its not a call to arms nor is it some kind of wicked battle-cry. And its definitely not some funny inside joke especially because everyones in on it. I wish I could say that this catchphrase is one big Gen-Z meme created to get a laugh out of people, but of course it isnt. Maybe we truly are living in some dystopian novel.

Representatives on the House floor are sporting Lets go Brandon merch and Florida Republican Bill Posey went as far as to end an October floor speech with the popular saying and a fist bump. Its not just in Washington either. A cryptocurrency called LGBcoin, or Lets Go Brandon Coin, attempted to sponsor Brown, whose name started this charade.

There are many Democrats and non-Trump supporters who think this whole ordeal is ridiculous. At the same time, many Republicans seem to actually enjoy the self-censorship they are participating in. Republican ad maker Jim Innocenzi said this new saying is done with a little bit of a class.

I think many would say that there really is nothing classy about this whatsoever. But regardless of whether the public thinks its classy or not, this whole ordeal just screams idiocy and highlights the hypocrisy of the GOP. The party of freedom of speech once spoke freely and didnt censor themselves on live TV. But now, months after the incident, pro-Trump Republicans are censoring themselves when that is the very thing they swore to fight against.

Honestly, if you want to criticize, ridicule or simply just cuss out the president or any other elected official just do it. There is no need to censor your language or hide behind a thinly veiled joke in order to get your point across. Its cowardly. Those that chant Lets go Brandon are playing into the exact thing they are supposedly trying to protect this country from.

Just swear next time. Itll save you from embarrassment.

Livia LaMarca mostly writes about American politics and pop culture. Write to her at [emailprotected].

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Opinion | The party of freedom of speech is censoring themselves - The Pitt News

What amounts to political incorrectness is highly subjective. As the old saying goes, one mans meat is another mans poison, but in so saying perhaps I may be accused of being non-PC because I failed to make it gender-neutral.

But the danger that I perceive is that the current level of hypersensitivity to any contrary opinion risks losing touch with basic reality, let alone common sense.

The notion that we should all get along with one another regardless of differences of opinion is, I suggest, a measure of the extent to which human beings are civilized as distinct from mere animals fighting to survive.

This is hardly a novel concept. Certainly Voltaires thinking along the lines that I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it was articulated in the mid-18th century.

We can all benefit from learning to accommodate the views of those with whom we disagree profoundly, but that presupposes that we have given them the opportunity to express themselves.

I disapprove of pulling down or desecrating statues of people who, historically, behaved in a manner judged fundamentally wrong or immoral by current standards.

There are more constructive and informative ways of reminding us of the tragic legacy of the past than just destroying such statuary.

History should never be expunged or rewritten if subsequent generations are to learn from the mistakes of the past.

In absolute terms, what is the difference between removing 17th-century slave trader Edward Colstons statue from its perch in the English city of Bristol and denying memorials to the victims of Tiananmen Square?

Instead of throwing Colstons statue into the harbor, how much more could have been achieved by attaching an explanation of the mans involvement in a diabolical trade, to remind people that slavery, in any form and at any time, is evil?

The acquittal of the four people indicted for criminal damage to Colstons statue has set up a hue and cry among swaths of Conservative members of the British Parliament and the minions of the fascistophile yellow press who are screaming for a law that will prevent such a miscarriage of their concept of justice.

There are more than enough laws on the statute books to deal with the impugned behavior.Yet all these yapdogs have found a champion in the person of Suella Braverman, Britains current attorney general.

This worthy is actively considering referring the jurys verdict to the Court of Appeal under a rarely used statutory power in her armory.

To do this, she will have to point to a grave error of law in the trial judges directions to the jury. The particular beauty of acquittal by a jury selected randomly from the local population is that, ordinarily, it cannot be overturned.

Even if Braverman does refer it to the Court of Appeal and that court finds fault in the judicial directions, the acquittal of the four people charged cannot be reversed.

But the concern of leading lawyers expert in criminal law is the attack upon the jury system, because, as the late Lord Devlin said, no tyrant could afford to leave a subjects freedom in the hands of 12 of his countrymen.

Rather than being blinded by what appears to have been verdicts that ran counter to the evidence, Braverman should be asking herself why a jury of ordinary Bristolians returned this verdict.

Every barrister experienced in criminal law which Braverman is not knows that juries have a remarkable facility for effecting a just outcome. That is part of the genius of the jury system.

Even if given impeccable directions by a trial judge and equally appropriate guidance by prosecuting counsel, a jury will return a verdict that accords with their understanding of their oath to try the defendant faithfully and give a true verdict according to the evidence. The critical words are true verdict.

There are occasions when a jurys verdict of not guilty may conflict with the evidence that has been adduced. But a close examination will usually reveal that the verdict is true to the innate justice of the case.

Some of us have experienced such an outcome where the judge abused his position of power over the proceedings to favor the prosecution. Done with skill, such judicial bias can withstand examination by an appellate court.

But a jury alive to such judicial attempts to achieve a conviction will, on occasion, do justice by acquitting the accused. By and large, juries dislike attempts to railroad them into a conviction.

Or as one cynic observed, should a jury be deprived of its inalienable right to be told what to do by the judge?

On other occasions, it may just be that the compelling human drama of the case conflicts with the letter of the law, and a jury sensitive to the facts effects justice by an acquittal.

Sometimes, a critical analysis of the prosecutions case indicates that the majesty of the law is akin to taking a steamroller to crush a nut. A robust jury could demonstrate its low regard for such a mismatch.

Suella Braverman, as a product of an administration mostly notable for its lack of anyone of genuine judgment or ability, not counting the liars and sleaze merchants, really would be wise to consult appropriate members of the legal profession before demonstrating such bigotry and jumping on board the ignoramus express.

Much the more significant issue is why such a jury would thumb their nose at the law. One answer readily to hand is that they wished to show the contempt in which they hold Prime Minister Boris Bunter Johnson.

What should not happen in an advanced society is the sort of knee-jerk reaction Suella Braverman epitomized in her pronouncement in the light of the jurys verdict.

This prostitution of the law for political purposes is anathema to the basic philosophy of the common law.

But Braverman has form for this.

While paying lip service to the obligation to honor an international treaty, her plastic concept of legality holds that a treaty can be breached because, in the cant of the Brexiteers, Parliament is sovereign. This overlooks the fact that it was the government holding a majority in Parliament that entered that treaty.

As the Bristol jury demonstrated, pigs do not have wings.

Neville Sarony QC is a noted Hong Kong lawyer with more than 50 years at the Bar. Follow him on Twitter @NevilleSarony

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Dimming the lamp of freedom - Asia Times

In most stories, the liberation of the concentration camps is the beginning of the end of a nightmare. But Austrian film Great Freedom shows that the truth wasnt as simple for everyone. In many cases, LGBTQ+ concentration camp inmates were simply transferred to prison cells.

Thats the most inhuman scandal explored in director Sebastian Meises Cannes Un Certain Regard winner: Germanys Paragraph 175, a provision of a German criminal code that reigned from 1871 to (shockingly) early 1994, criminalizing all homosexual acts between men. The story is told through the eyes and heavy, wearied soul of the fictional Hans Hoffmann, who is repeatedly imprisoned over decades in post-World War II Germany for being gay. Hes played by Franz Rogowski, the muse of German director Christian Petzold (Undine, Transit) and one of the most striking actors working in European cinema and beyond.

Over the course of his imprisonment, Hans forms a deep but often volatile bond with longtime cellmate Viktor (played by fellow Austrian actor Georg Friedrich), at turns platonic, romantic, sexual, and parasitic as Hans slowly resigns himself to the belief that life wont change and his may perhaps even be best lived out within the drab, crumbling walls of the dank prison.

RelatedRelated

Meise and co-writer Thomas Reider spoke to real men affected by the Paragraph while researching the film and eventually shot it in an actual prison in eastern Germany, forgoing recreating the cells on a studio. This devastating movie is now Austrias submission for the Best International Feature Academy Award, and last month landed on the shortlist of 15.

Rogowskis training as a dancer shows in his physical commitment to the role gaining and losing pounds across a shoot that took place before and then during the pandemic while conveying his characters broken interior through a somber, low-key, unmannered performance that suggests an actor who just shows up to set and does his job without pageantry. Meise, in our interview below for the film, confirmed that to be true.

Mubi releases the movie March 4 at NYCs Film Forum, followed by a national expansion. Academy voters shouldnt miss the vital Great Freedom, which tells a story of which not many of us including even the filmmaker before he embarked on the project are aware. While Paragraph 175 was repealed just over 25 years ago, the nation didnt start owning up to its actions until just a few years ago, issuing long-overdue apologies in hopes of redressing the continuing pang of systemic national guilt.

IndieWire: What was your knowledge of Paragraph 175, in terms of the criminalization of homosexuality in Germany?

Sebastian Meise: Actually, I didnt know so much about it. We came across these reports of gay men who were liberated from concentration camps and directly put into prison by the Allies, or put into prisons to serve their remaining sentences. We read that it was an article in some book about being gay in Hamburg and I couldnt really believe it. It sounded so bizarre. I discovered I have more knowledge about the queer history of the United States. I knew about the Stonewall riots. I was not aware of the dimension of the persecution. I did not know that there was a Paragraph like this. It was just not in our consciousness, in Austria and Germany. We never heard about this in school. I talked about this with the older generation, like with my father, for example. He didnt know anything about it, and he grew up at this time. We talked about this with a younger generation of gay people; they also had no knowledge. So we started researching, and the story grew more and more.

The story is fictional, but you did talk to a lot of actual people in the process. How did you find these individuals?

Theres a gay museum in Berlin, the Archive of the Memory. They conducted a series of interviews with people with personal experience. So we met these people. What we did in Vienna, theres an old gay caf, and theres always some older gay couples sitting in the back. We just went to them and talked to them. It turned out that everyone had experience with law enforcement back in the 60s. There was one very moving situation where one man, he was there with his long-life partner, he never told his partner he was in prison back in the 60s. It was such a taboo for them because in Austria and Germany, the state never acknowledged the fact that [being gay] had been a crime.

Since this wasnt abolished until the mid-1990s, what do you feel is the position toward the Paragraph is in Germany now?

Many things have changed in terms of LGBT rights, of course, but it was only 2017 that they took the first steps concerning apologies and things like this. In Austria, it was only this year that the Minister of Justice made an apology and declared officially that this was against human rights.

You shot the film before and during the pandemic, in an actual prison. Tell me about that atmosphere as a filmmaker where the actors are sharing a real cell, theyre sleeping in their cells, theyre smoking in their cells, just as you see in the movie.

There was a big discussion if we should shoot the cells in a studio, and I am not so much a fan of studio work because its just clean, and shooting in a real location does something to the atmosphere. Of course, it was a film set. It was an empty prison, and we decorated it and painted the walls and all that. It was cold. It was not easy to shoot. We had to bring the lights up. The real place did something to the team, and this is what I like about filmmaking: to have an anchor in reality somehow.

Mubi

How did you come to cast Franz Rogowski? We know him from the films of Christian Petzold and Michael Haneke. It sounds like you had him in mind writing it.

Halfway through the script, you see this film is going to happen one day probably, and you start to think about the cast. As a couple, [Franz Rogowski and Georg Friedrich] were in my mind immediately We were writing the characters for them, without knowing if they would even take the parts. But they did. Thank god. They came quite late, but there was space to improvise. Not too much, because it was a tight schedule, but we tried to give them places where they can find themselves or find the relationship.

The film tracks Hans persecution over the decades, as he is repeatedly sent back to prison for deviant practices.

This came quite early in the writing process because we were looking to translate the life he is in. I always said this is a story about two people who are stigmatized for life. Hans cannot change himself. The minute he walks out of prison, he is persecuted again. We were trying to find a way to translate this. Hes trapped in a time loop, somehow. This chronological way of telling the story we thought could be the best [approach].

Mubi

The way the film moves between time periods is fluid and seamless. Were there subtle modulations Franz would do in his performance, whether between the 40s, 50s, or 60s, to mark the passage of time or a world-weariness taking hold?

Its really subtle, but he lost like 12 kilos, in shooting from one era to another. Its not too obvious, but we were trying to find a way that makes it real somehow in addition to all the makeup stuff, which is always fake somehow. We were trying to find a way that, every time we come into another time with him, hes in a completely different stage of his life. He has a completely different energy. In the 40s, hes more like this animal, full of fear. In the 50s, hes full of energy, and in the 60s, hes more or less calmed down, and not believing that things will ever change.

He seems like the kind of actor who just shows up to set and is effortless about his approach. He doesnt seem like hes doing a lot of method or obsession between takes. What is his style?

He likes to talk a lot. Hes completely contrary to Georg. The great thing about [Franz], what I really love about him, he always tries to find a way not to act but just be the character.

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Dont Overlook Austrias Gay Prison Drama Great Freedom in the International Oscar Race - IndieWire

FAIRFAX, Va., Jan. 18, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Freedom Financial Holdings, Inc. (the "Company") (OTCQX: FDVA) andThe Freedom Bank of Virginia (the "Bank") along with its Board of Directors announce the approval of a new mission and strategy for the Freedom Foundation (the "Foundation") focused on economic inclusion. The Freedom Foundation's new mission is to support and foster relationships with non-profit organizations that promote financial inclusion and make the communities Freedom Bank serves, more vibrant, and more equitable.

The Foundation will receive donations from the Bank and its employees, as well as coordinate an annual event to leverage the platform to promote economic inclusion in the local community. The Foundation's renewed focus builds on the exciting work the Bank has engaged in with the Community Business Partnership (CBP) in launching the NOVA Technology Loan Fund which provides financing and technical assistance for minorities and entrepreneurs of color.

Joseph J. Thomas, President and CEO, commented, "I am thrilled to reinvigorate the Freedom Foundation with such an important focus and one that really resonates with my Freedom colleagues, clients, board members and me. To achieve the Foundation's new mission, we will seek philanthropies that foster financial inclusion and align with our values and strategies. Additionally, the Foundation will amplify the energy and engagement of Freedom Bank's employees by supporting financial inclusion organizations that our colleagues are committed to through a charitable employee match program. We are excited to start 2022 off with this new chapter for the Foundation and look forward to the meaningful impact our efforts will have in promoting economic inclusion in our communities."

In connection with reestablishing the Foundation, the Bank is rolling out a company-wide dedicated commitment to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEI&B) led by an internal DEI&B Committee. The initiative has been named "Keep Dreaming" and is timed with the celebration of Martin Luther King Jr's birthday. This initiative will include educational sessions, training, and volunteering opportunities to ensure each employee flourishes at Freedom Bank and that there is an organized way to help the communities the Bank serves.

About Freedom Bank

Freedom Bank (OTCQX: FDVA) is a next-generation community bank, headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia, offering commercial banking, personal banking, and mortgage banking solutions using banker expertise and innovative technology to build lead relationships with clients. Focusing on businesses, real estate owners, and professionals, Freedom Bank concentrates on key industry verticals to deliver unique, sector-specific solutions to help clients meet their goals and realize their dreams. Freedom Bank had total assets of $ 846.6 million on September 30, 2021, and sales office locations in Fairfax, Vienna, Reston, Manassas, and Chantilly, VA. The Freedom Bank Mortgage Division is headquartered in Chantilly, VA and the Freedom Bank Small Business Lending Division is headquartered in Harrison, NY. For information about Freedom Bank, visit our website at http://www.freedom.bank.

Contact:Joseph J. Thomas, President & Chief Executive OfficerPhone: 703-667-4161Email: [emailprotected]

SOURCE The Freedom Bank of Virginia

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Freedom Bank Board of Directors Approve New Mission and Strategy for The Freedom Foundation - PRNewswire