Random Play by Graham Reid

How wonderful that Ronnie is still performing, well into his retirement years. He's a one-off.

In the days before Sunday trash papers existed, and I'm thinking the 1940s and 50s, Ronnie's talent was a stalwart of the Sunday request session on the ZB network. I learned the words to "If I were a blackbird" almost before I could walk.

Your post has set me remembering some of the others that were so immensely popular with New Zealanders that they turned up every week in the Sunday requests.

Syrupy old Donald Pears (unless punished severely, I still do his coronation anthem "In a golden coach" as a party piece), the tinkling kitsch of the Robin's Return, the various satirical monologues of Johnny Stanley such as "It's in the Book" where we all sang along to "Grandma's Lye Soap", Stanley Holloway character monologues like Albert and the Lion, perfectly observed Joyce Grenfell songs and monologues (George, don't do that), Conrad Veidt's exotic "Where the Lighthouse Shines Across the Bay", and Joseph Schmidt's "Heut' ist der schönste Tag in meinem Leben". There were dozens of others that I won't spend space here recalling. They may seem odd today, but week in, week out, these few were the ones Kiwis chose to ask to listen to. Some are on the web today.

It does seem a different country. There are still no Sunday papers, as far as this household is concerned.

Perhaps I'm swimming against the tide, but I really like Te Papa. My son is an energetic child, finds most things in museums boring and stuff stuck in glass cases uninteresting.

He really enjoys going to te papa, likes the interactivity, and learns stuff while he's there. As I understand it Te Papa has had great visitor numbers, both from NZers and tourists. Surely the first point of the museum is to get people in the door? If you fail at that you're just a stuffy old archive.

Personally (and I say this as a historians), traditional museum displays that I saw as a child (which would have been the last time I was in the War Museum) are remarkably uninteresting. The use of video, noise, interactivity, new technologies make it a modern museum.

That doesn't need to 'dumb things down', but different media require different uses of information.

And the 'rides' that are at Te Papa with the digital surfing and whatnot? That's great fun to do with your kids. And it's still about learning, who says museums need to be about learning about the past, that's learning about the future.

A large part of the difference between "traditional" and "te Papa" displays, it seems to me, is not so much in the amount of information presented, as in what kind of information is presented. It is somewhat analogous to the difference between a dictionary (where there is a known organising system, and you can easily find a particular piece of knowledge that you want) and a Google search (which is much less obviously ordered, and where you will get a lot of less relevant information unless you already have a fairly clear idea what you want to find out).

One of my interests is natural history.

I enjoyed exploring the glass cases of the old National Museum (and similarly, the Wanganui and Auckland museums), and I appreciated the hierarchical taxonomy on display, as a system for grouping together related species. Because these were placed side by side, I could easily see what features they had in common, and what more subtle features distinguished them.

By contrast, the information in Te Papa's displays tends to be arranged, not in terms of any exhaustive detailed classification system, but instead in broad thematic groupings (such as by habitat type). This makes it harder to spot relationships between species -- but easier to see how they co-occur in context, and (depending on the quality of the display) what their roles are in their ecosystem.

On balance, I prefer the older style, as it was easier to get close enough to specimens to observe them in detail. I also prefer having enough mental space to think my own thoughts and draw my own conclusions about exhibits -- I find the audio and video components a little intrusive. But that doesn't mean the newer style is necessarily "dumbed-down".

Neither approach, by itself, seems entirely successful at presenting a living culture. In some ways the displays used by the Wanganui museum in the 1980s -- a combination of glass cases AND dioramas showing actual use -- were the best approach I've seen to that problem.

I think that the dynamic between Te Papa and Auckland is that regardless of how Auckland chose to present their offerings, Auckland's focus should be regional and war memorial, in the same way that Te Papa's focus is national. Auckland shouldn't be replicating what Te Papa is offering as an experience, but creating its own unique experience.

I think that another point of difference is that the Auckland War Memorial Museum is lucky to still have its heritage building, and should capitalize on this better. The building and the park are a beautiful point of difference, and if they can swing it, they should have more outdoor events and displays to capture the people who are recreational users of the park.

What I got from Ronnie was that if you just keep doing what you do with enthusiasm and enjoyment and don't resign yourself, then life might just go on as something to enjoy and not endure.

The musicians certainly seem to be able to do it. Bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley, born 1927, played the American Music Theater in Lancaster PA on 5 April, part of his regular touring schedule. Willie Nelson, just turned 75, starts a Coast to Coast tour in July and that whipper snapper Bob Dylan, 67 this Saturday, has just began his Spring tour at the Palladium in Worcester, Massachusetts and will take in places as far apart as Reykjavik, Iceland and St. Petersburg, Russia before taking a breather mid August after the last concert at the Virgin Mobile Festival in Baltimore, That’s about 70 concerts since he was here in August last year.

I love whistlers!I well remember 'If I were A Blackbird" and others...I whistle myself but cherish a long dead friend of mine who must've had a syrinx - he could return song phrases to tui! (not kidding.)
Well done Ronnie -and you for bringing this to our attention (if Ronnie ever wants a night at Okarito, we can guarentee 10+ locals at $20 each, and free board & meals (*really* good!))

Here was a man whose talent is rare and quite ignored by current fashion.

The same, I suppose could be said for this, which was a huge hit when I was about four:

I remember that song. But really, whistling and trying to look groovy and swinging all the same time? I wonder where the man is now........

Still whistling at 83, Alessandro Alessandroni:

The same, I suppose could be said for this, which was a huge hit when I was about four

You put acid in my coffee, right?

(That is one of the single greatest things I've ever seen. Thank you. The tune is vaguely familiar, but I had no idea of the original context.)

I hate this idea that museums are just disneyland for the kids of the educated middle class. They have important functions as centres of research and repositories of collections that go well beyond babysitting for Playstation attention spans.

From wikipedia:

In 1967, the pseudonymous Whistling Jack Smith (actually a session vocalist) recorded an all-whistling number called "I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman", which went Top 5 in the UK. Despite a title that baffled most Americans (who no doubt were thinking of the other Batman), the tune hit #20 on the Billboard charts.

Top 5 in the UK. And those funky video effects!

We live in a culture which extolls the virtues of youth, when Baby Boomers refuse to grow old (mea culpa me too perhaps?) and when people Botox and Pilate and do anything to offset the inevitable attritions of age.

Could we not put Ronnie in a Hoodie, give him a beatbox backing track, and maybe some vocals from 'the Streets'?

Most of the problems with the youth of today are caused by boredom. If we can just get the kids whistling they'll always have something to do. We could have Whistling Competitions, where the kids could join teams and have whistle-off's ... instead of Youth Gangs fighting eachother they could just Whistle For It!

The same, I suppose could be said for this, which was a huge hit when I was about four:

Book me a spot on Beat The Geeks (or just call me old). I knew that tune was from a movie:

Only When I Larf (1968)

This is an enjoyable, tongue-in-cheek glossy sixties romp whereby a couple of conmen and their girlfriend attempt to keep ahead of their 'marks' with mixed results.

A love-triangle develops as the young protege tries to take over the business and steal his old mentor's girlfriend. Inevitably they get under each others feet and start feuding and distrusting one another. As a result, the ending contains a good twist.

The direction is upbeat and enthusiastic, bright and brisk. The locations are shot well, and its accompanied by a catchy whistled theme tune throughout.

Also from Wikipedia:

A popular German army song "Ich war der Putzer vom Kaiser" ("I was the Kaiser's batman") sung during World War I tells of a soldier who missed the horrors of service on the Western front by being the batman to Kaiser Wilhelm II.

It was set to a contemporary tune for a whistling version in 1967, and released under the title "I was Kaiser Bill's Batman" in the United Kingdom and United States. The artist credited was "Whistling Jack Smith"; the public performer of the tune and the actual whistler who created it were two different people.

We could have Whistling Competitions, where the kids could join teams and have whistle-off's ... instead of Youth Gangs fighting each other they could just Whistle For It!

If only you'd suggested this before the 48 hour film contest. Could have run as a plot for Juvenile Delinquent or Dance/Musical.